


hatchet

by rottenstrawberrymilk



Series: short stories [2]
Category: Creepypasta - Fandom
Genre: Abusive Relationships, Angst, Anxiety, Cute, Depression, Developing Relationship, F/M, Flirting, Fluff, Insomnia, Internal Conflict, Kleptomania, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Nightmares, Obsession, Obsessive Behavior, Past Abuse, Possessive Behavior, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma, Sexual Tension, Stalking, Threats of Violence, Toby's in his twenties, Underage Drinking, Unreliable Narrator, Yandere
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-10
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:35:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 26,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25818178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rottenstrawberrymilk/pseuds/rottenstrawberrymilk
Summary: ticci toby x reader short story
Relationships: Tobias Erin "Toby" Rogers | Ticci Toby/You, Tobias Erin "Toby" Rogers|Ticci Toby/Reader
Series: short stories [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2125431
Comments: 23
Kudos: 207





	1. stranger

Every night you walked.

Nothing new--an old habit, maybe a few years old now. Consistent in keeping you content and your mind ease, of course. Something to numb your nerves with cold night air and make it easier for sleep to come to you when you finally returned to your bed. It started out as pacing. Just around the room, nails to teeth, eyes unfocused, everything blurred. And then pacing wasn't enough. So your feet lead you to the outdoors.

It wasn't much of a walk to the forest. All you had to do was go around the back of the house. Open a gate. Head right into the woods you'd seen time and time again through the window across from your bed. You used to think about disappearing into the woods forever when things were bad. Really bad.

But nowadays, you only disappeared for twenty minutes at the most. Ten minutes into the woods, ten minutes to walk out. You didn't have to dedicate to the idea of vanishing anymore. You could control that. You could control the experience of being completely alone in the darkness. Like a void but your feet still crunched on dead-leaf blanketed forest floor.

It...calmed you. Like it reset your mind. 

You thought maybe the ambience of the forest at night helped you sleep. Why lay in bed, eyes glued to the ceiling, listening to some grainy replica of rustling wind and lazily edited cricket chirps when you could submerse yourself into the real, _genuine_ thing. And all the toxicity seemed to leave your lungs, replaced with cold, sharp, pine night air. 

You wouldn't really call yourself much of a nature person in the day.

But at night, the woods was all you ever wanted. 

You couldn't explain it, but every time you returned from your little walks, you were met with a peaceful, black sleep. No dreams, no nightmares. Just the nothingness you'd craved so desperately for years before you had began to walk. 

Maybe you were thinking too hard about it. 

All you knew, was it felt good to move again, after spending the day laying around, stuck and lost in your own mind, too unmotivated to do anything. Some might have called it depression. And they would have been right. It was a rough cycle. Lay around. Do nothing. Tear yourself down for doing nothing. Walk around at night. Why can't you do that in the day? Why don't you walk around and do things in the day too? Go to sleep. Start all over again.

Mundane, but consistent. And consistency had put your mind at ease for the longest time. 

But your reliance on that same, boring consistency began to fizzle out.

Once again, you didn't know why. You weren't very good at looking into yourself and figuring things out on your own. Maybe you should go see a therapist? No. Waste of time. There's nothing wrong with you. There's nothing wrong with taking little walks at night to sleep easy. 

You walked the same path through the woods every day, careful not to stray from it. So many times, to the point where your footprints were the only recognizable ones on it. The treads on your heels had worn the path more than anyone else, you were sure. You were almost kinda proud of that. This was _your_ path. You knew every little mound, every boulder at the side, everything about it. You knew where it would gently bend or twist about. You could have walked it with your eyes closed.

But one night, that wasn't enough for you anymore. 

Once again, that same restlessness that had pushed you from the safety of pacing in your bedroom, to pacing onto that little dirt trail, was going to push you somewhere else. 

You felt bold.

And so, you strayed from the path. There was no other connecting trail to follow. You just...stepped off. And headed into the wild. 

It felt better. Better but scary too. And unsurprisingly, after you estimated what was about your usual ten minutes of walking, you found yourself confused. Confused, alone, and lost in the woods. Classic. Could it get any better than this? 

Your fingers traced over the rough bark of a tree as you passed by it in what you hoped was close to the right direction. You were tempted to bang your head against it. Stupid. Stupid. _Stupid_. No fucking _duh_ you were going to end up lost. You knew that from the second you stepped off that stupid, boring, worn down path that had lulled you to sleep time and time again. Reliable and consistent. But boring. Was it worth leaving it? You'd find out if you ever made it back.

It was impossible to recognize any sort of landmarks. It was dark. The most you were able to see was shadowy silhouettes of pines and logs and boulders all around. For a moment, you stopped, hands in your pockets, letting out a heavy and tense breath up towards the black sky above. It was overcast tonight. No stars and only the faint glow of the crescent moon. 

When the soles of your feet began to ache from wandering, you figured it was a good time to temporarily call quits and collect yourself before you had a full on meltdown in the woods. You found the sturdiest looking log and slumped down onto it, your shoulders hunched, your head in your hands, sucking in an anxious, tight breath. It was shaking a little bit. _Damn it_. Don't lose your cool. Don't loose your cool. Don't loose your cool-

Too late. 

You couldn't help it as warm, frustrated tears began to gather in your eyes. 

_Fuck._

It wasn't long before soft sobs shook you. For a second, you wondered why you were forcing yourself to be so quiet. It didn't matter--you were all alone in the woods, weren't you? You jumped from that train of thought quickly. That didn't matter _either_. For God's sake you didn't know where the hell you where, didn't _that_ matter a _little_ more at the moment?

Over the soft whistling breeze in your ear, you heard the sound of leaves crunching under shoes and rustling. You lifted your head suddenly as the log creaked under new weight. You turned your face towards the direction of the sound, realizing there was a boot propped on the log next to you. Your gaze traveled up to what appeared to be a man with strange orange lenses and covered face.

"Aw...don't cry..." came his muffled, deep voice as you took him in, your breath held.

You jumped, startled, to your feet, taking a few quick, unbalanced steps back. You still couldn't see him very well but managed to make out his shape better. He was holding something in his hand. An axe? No, no, it was smaller than an axe--a hatchet. Was there another one on his hip? Were you about to get murdered. 

Your muscles tensed as you prepared to make a run for it, apparently visibly enough for the man with the hatchets to notice. He held up both of his hands, the one bearing the axe slipping up to grip under the base so his fingers could straighten to somewhat mimic the outstretched, defenseless motion of the other. 

"Hey," he said, his voice carrying over to you. "Easy, easy." 

"Who the hell are you?" you snapped, once you found your voice again. It cracked with obvious fear and what was left of your tears. 

"Just a dude who wants t-to help you out. That's all." 

As if he didn't want you to view his promise as empty, he returned the hatchet in his hand to his free hip, where it hung. He held up his hands again, his palms outstretched facing you. He was wearing dark gloves. One of them had all the fingers ripped off, the one on the right, exposing his skin. Your gaze darted around the shadowy woods all over.

Had he been following you? Wouldn't you have heard him? Had he always been in here? How many times had you walked these woods with him in them at the same time? Did he live here or something? Why was he dressed weird? Why was his face all covered up? 

You managed to only stammer out one of the numerous, panicked inquiries rushing through your head. 

"Where...where did you even come from?"

He jerked a thumb back behind him, almost too quickly for your comfort. "I live a co-couple miles away. Got my own place. A ca-cabin. Really nice place, actually-"

"What the fuck is that axe for--are you gonna murder me?" It seemed a lot easier to ask questions now. 

"First of a-all, hatchet," he corrected. Was he rolling his eyes? You couldn't see his eyes very well in the dark and much less behind that visor, but you swore he was rolling his eyes at you. 

"I knew that," you shot back, crossing your arms suddenly. "I-I knew that."

He tilted his head to the side, the curls in his hair amplifying the little gesture. "Really?" he asked through what looked like a smug expression. If his mouth wasn't covered maybe you'd have been able to tell better. Upon getting no immediate response from you, he answered your previous question. "Well, anywa-ways, now that you asked so nicely, sure I mi-might just take a swing at you-"

You thought you were going to pass out from fear. Apparently he saw the look on your face and quickly spoke again. The blood pounding in your ears was practically deafening. 

"No, I'm kid-kid-ding. I come out here for firew-wood. It...smells better over here? Yeah." 

You still were coming down from the adrenaline, with your heart tight in your chest. You let out a shaky sigh. It made a lot more sense now. The hatchets, the weird forest (?) get up. It felt like he was telling the truth. You weren't enough of a lumberjack or a forester to really debate him on the smell of wood having to do with where he was.

"W-What do you want?" you eventually managed to get out. 

He put a hand to his side. "Well," he said. "Just wondering if you wa-want out of here or not." 

_See? Don't be so afraid. Not_ every _man's out to hurt you. Not everyone's out to get you. He's just a friendly lumberjack guy. That's all._

You nodded, your arms squeezing tightly around yourself momentarily. When had it gotten so cold out? You hoped you hadn't been out here for longer than half an hour...

"Follow me," he said confidently, offering a hand to you. 

You took it after the briefest moment of hesitation. His hand squeezed around yours lightly as he lead you past the log in the opposite direction you had come from. Had you really gotten that lost while wandering around trying to find the path again. The rough, thick fabric of his gloves chafed across your palm with each step he took. Beside the crunching of leaves underfoot, and the cicadas in the trees, it was quiet.

Awkward...

"Uhm. Your gloves. Very...lumberjacky," you tried, immediately feeling stupid as hell the minute you spoke. _Lumberjacky?? What??_ Whatever at least your heart wasn't beating so hard in your chest anymore. 

He gave a bit of a laugh which made you feel less stupid. "I'm not a lu-umberjack."

You tilted your head slightly, your breath caught for a second. Had he always been talking like that? Before you were so panicked, his voice had been very muffled and distant to you but now that you were calmer... Maybe he was cold? No, it didn't sound like he was shivering--it didn't feel like it either and his teeth weren't chattering. A tic? Maybe it was a tic. 

_Stop being so mean, oh my_ god. 

You didn't mention it, considering he was nice enough to help you and you didn't want to be rude to him. You felt like your silence was worse than straight up asking however, so you quickly tried to think of something else to continue the conversation.

_I don't even want to talk to anybody right now why am I going through all the effort in the first place?_

"Okayy...well what are you then?" 

He simply shrugged his shoulders, casting a look back at you momentarily through those strange orange glasses of his. "Just a dude in-in the woods. With two axes."

"Hatchets," you corrected smugly.

"I knew that," he mocked, referencing your own words from only a few minutes ago. 

It was easy to actually genuinely laugh at that. He joined in too. God, it'd been a long time since you actually laughed for real. You spent so much time alone nowadays it was hard to talk to people who managed to get a laugh out of you. Laughter faded into a more peaceful, comfortable silence once again as he lead you quietly in between the winding trees. 

The quiet only seemed to make his odd little...behaviors more observable. Although he wasn't talking, you noticed the occasional twitch of his head or fingers against your own. Sometimes his hand seemed to tighten at random without him noticing--out of his control even. Sometimes soft noises escaped him, sounding strained like he was trying to hold them back. 

For some reason, you relaxed a little more. Especially when you finally caught site of the path you'd left so long ago, like an ugly, winding dusty scar among the fallen pine needles and brush. He stood with you on it for a second, his hand still holding yours before he released it. Your arm fell to your side again as you averted your gaze slightly and kicked at the dirt path. 

"Thanks..." You muttered out, a bit shyly. 

"There you go. Back on your pa-path." 

Your brows furrowed as you looked back up at him. "How'd you know-" 

He shrugged his shoulders. "You are-aren't the only one out here who uses these-these woods to...destress." 

"...I don't really know how to take that," you responded. 

From the way his eyes crinkled up slightly from behind the tinted lenses, you thought he was smiling. "However you want." He turned to leave the path, putting up a hand to wave you off. "See you around." 

He said it like it was a statement rather than a question or a suggestion, like he fully intended on finding you again, which you found rather interesting but also kinda creepy at the same time. He was already gone before you could call out to him and ask for any sort of explanation to as what he was implying. Still, you figured it was better to be on a man with two hatchets's good side rather than his bad side. At least, you hoped you were on his good side. If you ever saw him again. Which you definitely wouldn't. For sure. 

Your hands tucked into your pockets as you turned away from the woods as well and began to tread back down the path, slow in your step. You'd already been out for so much longer than usual, any thoughts of urgency had left you awhile ago. 

You still had to figure out whether or not what just happened was real. 

It was strange to know that the possibility of someone else out wandering the woods at night along with you was confirmed, but it was also a little cool. All this time some guy in crazy glasses and a fur hood jacket was walking in the trees too. Maybe your nightly walks weren't so unique to you after all. The thought of it surprisingly didn't bother you as much as you thought it would.

Even with someone like him being the one out there with you. 

_What a strange guy..._


	2. hermit crab

Many sleepless nights spent in your room rather than the woods followed your encounter with the stranger in the forest. A sort of strange anxiety seemed to overcome you every time you considered going back out at night again. You missed your walks. You missed the ambience of the night. It made you nervous, now knowing you were sharing it with someone else. Well...maybe not sharing it. To be frank, you'd been considering surrendering your place there, just so you wouldn't have to run into the stranger again...

But some part of you...wanted to run into him again. 

You weren't one to suddenly find yourself weighed down with burning, distracting curiosity but here you were, laying in your room as the sun rose up, legs drifting off the end of your bed, a thumbnail at your lips. Trying to figure out who the hell this stranger was. Why hadn't you noticed him earlier? Why had you never heard of someone just living in the woods several miles away from this small town? Had he been hiding from everyone for that long in there? That's what you assumed he was doing at least--hiding. 

_That's a little rash...dramatic too. Maybe he's just one of those people that likes to be alone...gahh I know nothing about this guy..._

You reached up, grabbing a pillow from the messy, unmade sheets of the bed. You brought it to your face, squeezing your eyes shut tightly as you let out a sigh into the fabric. Your fingers squeezed at it, hard, before you let it fall away from your face and hugged it close to your chest, your eyes still trained on the ceiling.

_Did I properly thank him? Maybe I should do that..._

It was a flimsy, pitiful excuse to pursue your newfound curiosity. But, hey, it was the first time in a long, long time you'd ever felt...motivated to do something. Especially when it involved someone else. It could be a good distraction until you sunk into your next usual unmotivated slouch. 

You sat up, dropping the pillow on the floor as you went to grab your phone from the bedside.

_It's pretty early...maybe he's only out there at night? Whatever. At least in the daytime I'll be able to see where I'm going. It'll be harder for me to get lost maybe. There's some service in the woods isn't there? I think I see cell towers near the trees sometimes..._

You shoved on your shoes, stuffing your phone in your pocket, before heading out to the path in the woods. It seemed unfamiliar at first in the daytime. More eerie somehow? _That_ was weird. Still, you took a deep breath, the morning air sharp and cold and unfamiliar in your lungs before pressing onwards. It didn't take long for everything to start to fall into place again and lure you into the same trance you normally fell in during night, however. You didn't expect any less, considering the lackluster hours of sleep you were operating on. 

_Just say thank you to him again, and then go back to walking at night so you can finally fucking sleep. Easy as that. Maybe I can figure out something with him where he can have the woods on weekends and I can have them on weekdays. No that's fucking dumb, what are? Divorcee parents? Ugh, stupid...God I wanna sleep._

Although most of your vague thoughts seemed to be centered around way to avoid the stranger in the woods at night, you still couldn't help but remember how...okay you were the night he had met you. How okay you were about the idea of sharing this place with him. He'd seemed friendly enough, after all, what would be the harm?

_He could be the harm. Men are trash. Remember who seemed nice too? Remember how long it took for_ him _to wrap his fucking hands around your neck-_

You stopped suddenly, taking in a quick breath. Your hand tightened around your phone in your pocket as you turned your head. Seems like the same place you went off the trail the few nights before. Whatever, it was close enough. You'd rather be focused on navigating over getting too lost in your own damned head. You felt a streak of bitterness, once again, knowing that even your brain ended up hurting you. Brains aren't supposed to do that. 

_Even if I can't find him again, I need to walk tonight. I really could use the good sleep. Three hours a night isn't gonna cut it for much longer..._

You stepped off the path and held still for a moment, waiting for the same rush you got the last time. Anddd...nothing. Maybe you were just super, super melodramatic at night or something. You let out a bit of a sigh and rolled your eyes at nothing in particular before pushing onwards.

_This is sorta familiar right? Like that tree...that tree was...like near there. Maybe? Or that rock. Think I remember that rock. Probably. Yeah._

By some sheer dumb luck or fate alone, you somehow managed to find yourself coming within range of the clearing you'd ended up in those nights ago. You recognized the log and the way it was angled against another tree. There was something new in the clearing however, a big stump, like a tree had been chopped down. 

_Well I guess that makes me feel a bit better about those hatchets. Like he wasn't lying about them...am I always this paranoid?_

You stood by the stump, glancing around somewhat stupidly. You pushed some of your hair back away from your face. No sign of the stranger. You bit the inside of your cheek. Was this a stupid idea? Maybe this was a stupid idea. Then again, so was manically convincing yourself if you didn't walk every night you'd never sleep again instead of actually confronting the problem but- 

_Maybe he's already back in his cabin. The one that's...miles away. In whatever direction. God this really was a stupid idea..._

You wondered if you were about to cry again for no reason other than pure frustration. 

"You-you look lost. Aga-again." 

_Oh thank God..._

Almost too eagerly, you turned around, recognizing the voice behind you. It was the stranger from before. He stepped over the log, his hatchets swinging on either one of his hips as he did so. He looked back up at you. Was there a hint of smugness in his face? Maybe a juvenile aura of teasing? 

"Did you no-not learn your less-son the first time?" He crossed his arms over his chest, his shoulders looking even broader in the bulky jacket he was wearing. He drew closer. "What if I was-wasn't here? Betcha' wouldn't be-be able to find your way b-back, huh?" 

You toyed with the neckline of your oversized shirt slightly, suddenly feeling a bit flushed. "I was kinda banking on you being here," you admitted. 

In the daylight he was easier to see. Much easier. Like, on the eyes too. A tangled mop of curly brown hair fell, unruly, upon his head. He looked a bit older than you, maybe in his mid-twenties, but still young in his own right. Even with his sunset tinted lenses over his eyes and his dark mouthguard pulled up, you could see some of his facial features. There were some scars on the left side of his face that only seemed to add to his general mysterious vibe--maybe burn scars? Part of his left eyebrow seemed to be completely missing and his right wasn't lacking in scars either. You figured the mouthguard was hiding much worse scars and felt a bit of pity of him. 

His brow raised, what was remaining of the left one anyways. You realized you had been staring in silence for a good few moments.

You gave a bit of an awkward cough, feigning clearing your throat before your hand went to your arm and you averted your gaze back to the trees. "I just wanted to like...thank you. Again, I guess. For helping me out of the woods the other night, uh..." 

"Toby," he answered, probably assuming you were looking for his name (which you weren't). "You can ca-call me Toby. Just-just you though."

In the daylight and up close you could also better observe the way his face seemed to contort and the way his facial features seemed to twitch, forcing him to stammer and stumble over his words. Your assumptions about what you thought was him having a tic was correct. Upon seeing you go quiet and stare again, he seemed to shift a little awkwardly himself. 

Quickly, you talked again. "Yeah, yeah, okay! Uhm, yeah. Thanks for helping me out...Toby." 

He nodded, seeming relieved that you responded. His arms dropped back to his side, finding a place at his hips, near his hatchets. "No problem." For a moment, Toby seemed to regain his confidence. "You-you're a real sweetheart for coming all the wa-way back out here to tell me that. Again." 

Was he flirting with you?

_All men._

Still, you couldn't help but blush and smile a little bit. You opened your mouth to make a comeback but couldn't find the words. You let out a bit of a scoff, humorous in nature, before pushing your hair back again. Still, nothing popped in your brain for you to say back.

Toby leaned a little bit forward. "Here for anything else?" He arched a brow.

You considered lying to him. Saying no and backing away and fucking off back to your house so you wouldn't bother him anymore but...you didn't know. Something about the way he was just standing there...did he want company maybe? And you were still curious about him. Why not kill two birds with one stone? You didn't have anything planned for today anyways...like usual.

"Uhm, actually yeah...I'm just...I just find myself, like, a little curious about your whole..." you gestured to him as his shoulders jerked slightly. "...deal here." 

You couldn't see his mouth but you imagined he had a bit of a knowing smile spread on his face. "Hmmm...how s-so? I think I'm pre-pretty normal as far as most dudes go..." 

"N-No, I mean like, like why do you live all the way out here? A-And why have I never even heard of you before? Or anyone living out here?" you blurted out. 

Toby shrugged again, this time more naturally and smoothly, indicating that it wasn't a tic. Just him. "I dunno. I just live...better on my own. At least that's what I've _been_ thin-thinking for awhile..."

You ignored his odd, off to the side little reply. Like he was thinking out loud on purpose, trying to bait you into prying further into what he meant. Not this time. 

"Like a hermit?" you asked.

"You mean like the crab?" 

You couldn't help but reward him with a genuine laugh. It was so stupid, but maybe that's what you needed. To talk to someone who wasn't going to take themselves as seriously as you did. You wondered if Toby was the class clown type beat kid when he was in high school. Your smile faded when his head seemed to violently snap to the side and his face contorted once again. 

Upon having your attention on him, he rubbed his face, his fingers pushing under his orange tinted glasses for a moment. He looked a bit sheepish and exasperated and...a little tired too. He looked up again, his glasses settling back comfortably onto his crooked, scarred nose. 

"Okay, cutie, let's get this out of the w-way. I've g-got Tourette's. Those are my tics," he said, somewhat curtly. Was he embarrassed? You felt bad now. You'd tried hard to act like you didn't notice his stammers and jerks before but you figured it would just be more insulting to him if you tried to continue that. 

Quickly, you responded. "O-oh, yeah, I figured, I mean...yeah. Uhm. I think my cousin on like...my dad's side has Tourette's too. I don't really remember. I was really young when I last saw him. He was cool though."

Toby tilted his head to the side apprehensively. "Oh really?" 

And the conversation seemed to naturally flow from there, no matter how strange the origins. It felt almost fueled by your own anxiety. Several times you wondered if you should just shut up, wondering if you were getting dangerously close to oversharing but...it wasn't like Toby was going to do anything with that information, right? He lived on his own in the woods, after all. And it was better than awkward silence. You just didn't want to make him think you were weird or anything.

_Does he already think I'm weird? Am I weird for coming back to see him? Just to say thank you again but still..._

But some part of you already knew that this Toby guy wouldn't ever really think of you as "weird". 

And as you sat upon that stump next to him, you found yourself relaxing more and more. He was just...easy to talk to. It was like he had endless stories that you couldn't really verify but didn't mind listening to. And soon you didn't even notice his tics or the movements of his facial features.

You hadn't even realized you'd spent hours with him until you pulled out your phone, out of habit, to check the time.

"Holy fuck," he said, sitting up straighter to stare at the screen in your hands, "I've been g-gone awhile haven't I?" 

Although his voice was light, there was a sort of sudden and new...sadness to it. You looked over to him, concern written plainly on your face. 

"What? You haven't seen a phone?" you asked, your brows knotted in confusion. 

He looked back at you. "No, no, I'm no-not like a fuckin' caveman..." He reached to the back of his head, grabbing at some of his curls. "Uhh, I did had a phone like aw-awhile ago...it's just..." he gestured at your phone. "It didn't look a-all future-y and sleek like that one." 

You gave him a bit of a smile, turning more turns him so he could get a better look at your phone. "Wanna see?" you asked, albeit a bit shyly.

"Hell yeah." 

He scooted closer to you as you bypassed your lock screen and began to show him all of the apps. Without any sort of steady service there wasn't much social media you could use and you couldn't really look up anything for him without it severely buffering. He was too impatient for all of that (you could tell), so you found different ways to keep his attention. 

You didn't really know what type of music he was into or if he even listened to it, but you figured it was worth a shot.

"You can listen to so much more music now, too," you told him, offering the phone to him. 

"Fuckin' sick," he muttered, taking it, typing in what you assumed to be a band name. 

He looked absolutely overjoyed when a bunch of songs came up as a result. The corners of his eyes scrunched up and he reached up to push back some of his thick hair in obvious excitement. He made you listen to about three of them, which wasn't exactly unpleasant. You were surprised to find that his taste in music wasn't terrible at all.

But you also began to take notice of how the bands he was listening to had gone out of style maybe...years ago? He didn't seem to notice at all. 

_He's been off on his own like...for a really long time. Like. Years and_ years. 

"No, no, li-listen. This was my favorite one fr-from-" he seemed to lose control over both his voice and face as he had a rather violent fit of tics. It took him a good few seconds to recover as he sucked in a breath, fidgeting with his mouthguard, his fingers still shaking slightly. "From awhile ago," he finally finished. 

Gently, you took the phone from his hand. He let you, his hand dropping back to his leg. His face had become rather grim. 

_What drove him off into the woods?_

He reached up to stiffly scratch at his cheek. He didn't notice your eyes on him as he went to clear his throat. 

_And why has no one looked for him?_

Glimpses. Little, tiny glimpses of his burn scars, more noticeable and rough in the daylight. You hadn't realized their severity until you really, really looked at them. 

_Toby, what happened to you?_

You would never ask that. Not now. Not ever. If you saw him again that was. You figured it was also kind of early to try and take a go at unearthing the trauma and past of a stranger--er, Toby-- who'd been nothing but kind to you. 

Honestly, you didn't know how long you'd sat in silence with him, your leg up against his. You felt almost bad, knowing that the sun was going down you were probably about to leave him for the night. You felt almost...drained. Even though all you'd done was talk with him. 

_Right...the three hours of sleep...that might have something to do with it probably._

"I should probably get back home," you eventually managed to tell him, feeling guilty already. 

"That s-seems a little redundant, considering your little night ti-time walking hab-bit," he said, a big smugly, resting his chin on his hand as he cast his gaze over to you. 

"You know what," you responded, giving him a smile as you wrapped your arms around yourself, your elbow bumping with his arm, "I think I'll be okay. Think I might even get some sleep tonight too, even without walking..." 

But you were dead wrong about that.

That night, your dreams were the most tumultuous they had _ever_ been. You'd woken up crying, nails digging in sheets, feeling as though something truly and completely awful had happened. It was the usual nightmare. Of fingers tightening around your throat as you clawed desperately at arms that would never ease off you. And as you were strangled you saw a figure.

Tall, gaunt, no face. Standing. Staring. Watching.

He was new.


	3. thrill

It was pretty fair to say that what you remembered of your new nightmares was scaring you--badly. And so, by the next night, you were back out in the woods. If you were bold enough maybe you would have been prescribed with sleeping pills. But you didn't have the energy to go to a therapist or a physician. How were you even supposed to do that anyways? Just make an appointment? Who would you call?

Too much work.

You'd stick to the forest thank you very much.

For the first few nights, you were disappointed to find that you were all alone. Which was stupid because...that's what you wanted. That's how these walks were supposed to go, just you and the forest and no one else. But you couldn't stop thinking about Toby. You couldn't stop looking over your shoulder to find him.

So, once again, you ventured off the trail. It seemed less and less like you were finding him and more and more like he was finding you. When you'd found him, he wasn't even doing anything. He wasn't chopping wood or-or hunting for something. He was just sitting there, back against a tree, finger tracing over the blade of his hatchet before he looked up again and the corners of his eyes crinkled up in an obvious smile.

Once you'd caught him off guard in a middle of a conversation. You'd grown somewhat curious, yet scared and maybe a little...jealous all at the same time. Was there someone else here that he was talking to when you weren't around? You hadn't thought about what he did here in the daytime or if there was someone else other than you that he was friends with. You didn't really know how to react when you'd come closer and simply observed him talking to...nothing. Just no one. He was talking to absolutely. Nothing. 

Should that have worried you? Maybe?

He seemed to start getting mad. You couldn't comprehend exactly what he was saying, you just knew he was getting louder and angrier. He didn't seem...right

_Should I say something?_

When you'd cleared your throat and stepped into his sight he'd instantly started talking to you like nothing at all had happened. All the anger left his face and the energy you were familiar with returned. He seemed absolutely fine now. You decided to play along.

At least he wasn't _actually_ talking to someone that wasn't you. 

_Then who the fuck was he talking to? Just mind your fucking business. Don't judge him...he's harmless. He's fine. Maybe he's just bored. Or maybe he used to do that before he met me and he hasn't broken the habit yet. Lots of people talk to themselves._

You'd spent a good amount of time in your head trying to justify whatever the hell you just saw. Most of Toby's frantic attempt at distracting small talk fell numb on your ears.

 _But he wasn't talking to_ himself _. He was talking_ at _something._

You decided to drop it, which he seemed infinitely and silently grateful for.

However, you did notice that he started seeking you out first to make sure you couldn't catch him off guard again. 

Something else you chose not to look too much into.

_He just likes me. He's excited to see me and can't wait. Yeah._

And soon, you didn't even have to stray off the path to find Toby. He just...showed up on your usual trail within five minutes of you being in the woods. You didn't know how he found you so quickly every time and you didn't bother asking, afraid it would scare him off and make him mad or make him think you _still_ remembered when he was talking to nothing.

But you reminded yourself every time that he was a genuinely chill dude that you didn't mind sharing your night with. A little weird, but that was fine. That didn't make him any less of a good companion to have at night. You no longer feared the hatchets hanging at his sides. If anything, you felt as though you had some sort of protection if you happened to run into someone else that _wasn't_ Toby and _wasn't_ nearly as friendly as him either. 

He walked at your side, slowing your pace slightly, which was annoying at first, you'd admit. But soon you grew used to that as well. The slower you walked, the more time he spent talking to you anyways. You and him spoke for what seemed like hours. Back and forth in the woods. Every night. It was surprisingly just as relaxing as walking in silence. You hadn't really been able to share your thoughts with anyone else for a really long time, considering most of your time you'd spent alone before Toby.

Sometimes he even took you off the trail to cool spots in the woods that he'd kept secret and to himself for years. 

The first time he took you to a small, practically flawless clearing with brush and wildflower scattered everywhere and a small, gurgling waterfall that fed into a brook. He had you sit by the brook, on top of some flat boulder while he fished various interesting rocks out of the water and showed them to you. You didn't really give a fuck about the rocks, but you could tell he liked them and that was enough for you. Sometimes, when he found rocks he liked you watched him tuck them in the pockets of his jacket or into his jeans. 

You thought it was kinda cute.

"You wa-want one? S-Saw you lookin..." Toby said to you, stepping up and out of the stream. He crouched down in front of you before you could deny him and reached for your hand. 

"Ah, well, I-" you tried as he took you wrist and pulled your arm forwards. He ignored your stammering and easily opened your hand, placing one of the stones in it. He pressed your fingers back around it, holding your hand between his gloved ones as he looked up at you expectantly. 

You pulled your hand closer and opened it, observing the rock. It was about the size of your palm, smoothed by water erosion, with a streak of an orangish looking mineral. You held it up to the side of Toby's head, making a show of comparing it to his trademark lenses. 

"Looks just like your glasses," you commented. 

"Lem-me see," Toby said, taking the rock from your hands, still squatting down in front of you. He lowered his head, taking off his safety glasses. You fell quiet as he looked back up, staring down at the orange streaked rock and his lenses. 

You'd noted that his eyes had been dark, something that was easy to see even behind his tinted glasses. But you had to admit that you liked them a lot better without the color tint. They were brown, deep, deep brown, made even darker by thick eyelashes. Sort of...gentle almost. Apparently he must have felt your stare on him because he suddenly looked up at you, his eyes searching your face. 

He ducked his head and pushed the safety glasses back up onto the bridge of his nose. 

"So what'd you think?" you asked quickly, trying to break the awkward silence.

He shrugged his shoulders before handing the stone back to you. "You're ri-right. Think it'll rem-remind you of me?"

"Are you going anywhere anytime soon?" 

The corners of his eyes scrunched up again in a broad, hidden smile as he shook his head. "No. Never." 

And you believed him.

Later that week, he took you somewhere new (with not as many rocks, he promised) that he said you would find "super fucking neat". It seemed upstream of the brook he'd show you earlier on. The wildflowers and brush became much more condensed and trees seemed to clear out a lot more, only scattering a few here and there in your line of sight. It seemed like some sort of mini-meadow, covered with tall, sweeping grass.

And deer.

Lots of deer.

You'd gasped when you saw them all, either standing around lazily or sleeping at the bases of the sparse trees. There were some fawns as well and you'd be lying if you said they weren't _extremely_ cute. Toby had you duck down in the tall grass with him so none of them would get spooked. His arm stretched over your shoulder as he drew you closer to separate some of the grass and make the deer more visible to you. Their ears twitched when they heard the rustling grass, but they didn't move. 

"That one's the le-leader, I think," Toby told you, pointing out one of the largest ones in the clearing. "They come chill h-here every few months or so. Loo-looks like we got lucky, hu-huh?"

He didn't need a response to know that you were absolutely fascinated with them. Starstruck is the word he'd have used to describe you right there and then, staring all wide-eyed at the antlers and flanks gleaming in the moonlight. He thought you looked kinda cute. 

All the things you could have missed out on if you had stuck to that old, familiar path so far back...

"Y-You're a fawn."

You looked at him. "What?"

"Ne-nevermind. You hungry?" Toby suddenly asked.

"Are you gonna try to _kill_ one of them? Because I-"

Toby put a hand to his mouth, stifling a laugh. "N-No, what do I look like, an ani-animal?" he rolled his eyes behind sunset tinted lenses before leaning forwards. "There's a 7/11 li-like...ten minutes away from here, c-cross a road." 

The smile left your face. You'd never really...gone anywhere else before. Sure you'd gone off the path into the actual wild parts of the forest with Toby but you'd never actually...like _left_ left the forest before. You put a hand to your cheek, leaning your head slightly as you tried to think of an answer. Or an excuse? Maybe you could-

Toby let out an exasperated, shaking sigh, muffled behind the dark cloth covering his face. "Come o-onnn..." He brushed a finger over your cheek, before arching it at your chin and tilting your head up slightly. "All we ever do is _walk_. Let's d-do something differ-different. Just come sho-shop-p- with me? We wo-won't be long..." 

You hadn't caught the last part of what he said. You were too busy trying to focus between his fingers at your face, _touching you_ , and the feeling as though your world was being turned upside down. Toby had been safe. Toby had been the one, consistent thing. Were you being overdramatic? You were starting to think you were when you realized how untrue what you just thought was.

_The only thing consistent about Toby is that he shows up every night. Everything else is...new with him. But it feels safe. He makes it feel safer and like I can do it. So...what's the harm?_

You nodded and everything else seemed to be a blur up until time stood still and you were in a brightly, obnoxiously lit convenience store with your hands in your pocket, trying not to make eye contact with anyone in there. Why the fuck were there three other people in the store? That was wayyy too many. Honestly, wherever Toby took you wasn't a 7/11. It just seemed to be a minimart that he happened to call "7/11". You grew a little irritated, feeling like he'd lied to you. But a part of you knew he genuinely thought this store was a 7/11, so the frustration faded quickly.

You turned, pacing the aisles in an attempt to find him. He was pretty easy to spot in his big jacket. He had his hood up. He turned to look at you. For the first time in good lighting, you saw his face, without the cloth over his mouth and without the glasses. The safety glasses were propped up on his head, under the hood, and he had the cloth dropped down to his neck. 

You hadn't realized how bad the scars on his face were. Part of his upper lip seemed to be gone...chewed off? It looked like? It exposed some of his teeth and further scars dragged up his face. He noticed you were staring and you felt instantly bad about it. Giving a bit of a sniff, he wiped at his nose, hiding the bottom half of his face as casually as he could.

"It's not s-smart to just...we-wear a mask in a convenience st-store, y'know? Comes off-off as suspicious." 

You furrowed your brows. "You're just here to buy things though--why would they care?"

He raised his eyebrows at you. With a smirk, that looked off putting with his exposed teeth, he reached out quickly, and pulled a candy bar from the aisle, sneaking it into his pocket before shoving his hand in with it. He rolled his shoulder slightly beneath his jacket.

" _Shoplifting?!_ " you'd hissed at him, once he'd finally finished stealing anything else that caught his eye and strolled back outside and across the street with you. "I thought you said you wanted to go _shopping."_

Sheepishly, he shrugged, pulling down his safety glasses again as he made his way down the slope and back into the woods. One of his hands was tight on your arm, keeping you from losing your balance at his side as he picked his way down the steeper parts. "Do-does it matter now?" he asked, once you reached the bottom with him. "There's five Snickers in my pockets." 

You stared at him, the tension so thick you could have cut it with one of the hatchets at his sides. He stared back before he slowly pulled one of the candy bars out of his pocket and tapped you on the nose with it, making you flinch.

"Boop," he said. 

You bit the inside of your cheek, inhaling sharply. Then, you snatched the candy from his hand and began to unwrap it. "This is illegal blood candy," you grumbled to him, turning away to eat it. You were fucking _starving_ , holy _hell_ , how long had you been out here with him for? 

"Stolen sh-shit tastes better, on God," Toby told you, tucking his hands back into his pocket. He cast a glance back up at the slope. 

_He's totally right..._

Then again, it might have just tasted so good because you were hungry as hell, but it was also almost...kind of flattering that he stole one for you. Your cheeks flushed slightly (which you were hoping he couldn't see in the dark), as you turned back to face him. 

Toby had this sort of look in his eye. This sort of frantic breath in his chest, like the hairs on the back of his neck were raised. You were long out of the store with him, but you felt it too. The same that he was feeling. The thrill. Just the idea of getting caught red-handed. 

He looked back directly at you, the moonlight catching his hair and turning it a silvery sheen. And he saw you shared his thrill, wild and unable to be hidden in your eyes and body, no matter how unhappy with him you pretended to be. 

Maybe that was when your addiction to him started.


	4. rotisserie chicken

Honestly, you hadn't thought you'd continue to hang around Toby due to his...stealing habits. It wasn't right, you'd told yourself time and time again. Stealing was wrong. _He_ was wrong to be doing it. But he made it seem...reasonable, almost. And when he started to get you into shoplifting with him...well...

He was a bad influence, alright? But he was so, _so_ fun. 

The minimart was a favorite among the two of you. No cameras, a cashier that always seemed to be dozing off, or didn't care enough to pay attention. He helped you start taking small things at first. Candy, gum, once even a phone charger from near the register.

Once you stole a lighter and gave it to Toby as a gag gift. It was the tackiest thing you'd ever seen, with the cheapest looking, gaudiest, eye-bleedingly _awful_ and oh so edgy bright orange flames printed on it. You told him you didn't care if he tossed it. He thought it was "sick as hell" and instead pocketed it before pulling you into a twitchy hug and thanking you profusely to tease you. Toby wouldn't let go, which lead to an awkward, standing-up wrestling match that you only managed to break out of after you threatened to punch him in the dick. He thought that was funny and you ended up storming off, flustered as all hell. So that definitely backfired a little bit.

He didn't mind whenever you had your little tantrums. He knew you'd always be back the next night.

Whatever the two of you did take from the minimart, you normally ended up eating together in the woods. You even stopped eating dinner, knowing that you'd be eating later at night with Toby anyways. 

He made it a game. Just for you and him. 

Once he even stole an entire fucking rotisserie chicken. 

"I didn't even see you take it," you told him when he'd wrestled it out from under his thick jacket and presented it to you, looking properly proud of himself. 

"Why e-else do you think I have such a big-big-ass jacket? It's e-exclusively meant for stealing ro-rotisserie chicken, cu-cutie." 

You were too busy trying to figure out, for real, how the fuck he snuck an entire fucking chicken out of the minimart without even you noticing. You didn't chastise him for the sappy pet name like you usually did. You were pretty sure he didn't know your name and you felt like it'd be awkward to tell him this far into...whatever the hell it was that you two had. Not dating. You weren't dating the weirdo in the woods. You were just friends with him. That's it. 

Realizing that you'd gone quiet and Toby was now staring at you expectantly, you scrambled to put together a teasing reply. "See, I just thought you liked that dummy big jacket because you think it makes you look buff." 

"So _y-you_ think I look buff right now?" he'd shot back, his smile visible as he walked at your side, keeping the chicken at his side. He didn't wear his mask as much around you anymore, letting it drop slack around his neck, like he was a lot more comfortable. You were also becoming a lot more used to his scars, so you didn't mind it. 

You scoffed. "No, I think _you_ think you look buff. _I_ think you look like a big dork." 

The two of you continued to banter playfully back and forth, all the way back to the familiar clearing with the stump and log you'd first met him at. He'd sat down to crack open the container and finally eat the rotisserie chicken, which was still plenty warm and actually smelled _really_ good. Upon seeing the look on your face, he offered to share, which you gladly accepted. After what was probably months of stealing mostly artificial, sweetened candies and garbage, weirdly enough a chicken seemed like the most appetizing thing in the world. Like your first _actual_ dinner with him. 

"I still can't believe you stole a fucking rotisserie chicken," you told him, a bone between your fingers. 

Toby's hand was covering his mouth as he finished his bite of meat. You appreciated that habit of his. As used as you were to his scars now, there was something especially haunting about the torn up side of his mouth. He knew his eating wasn't a pretty sight. 

"I wanted to get you-you something nice," he said, reaching across the stump to nudge you gently. Toby was getting a lot better at talking to you without his usual tics. From what you could tell, the more at ease he was, the less violent his tics were and less often they occurred. Once again, you were flattered to think that he was so comfortable being around you that some of his burdens seemed to ease as well. 

You hadn't thought of it right then, but you realized seconds later that when Toby touched you, you didn't flinch or yank away. Your mind didn't race and your head didn't spin and your breath didn't quicken. It was...okay. For him to touch you. You could trust him and he'd never hurt you. Not like...

"Wanna, like, watch a movie after this? Like. Dinner and a movie?" you suddenly asked.

_Wow why the hell did I say it like that, damn-_

"You can do that n-now? On your phone?" Toby's head inclined slightly with a bit of skepticism. You furrowed your brows at him. Surely he hadn't been living in the woods _that_ long, right? Toby tossed a bone out into the forest. "Don't l-look at me like that. The most I-I ever had was an MP3 player-"

"An _MP3 player_?" you asked, mimicking his action and tossing the bone that once laid idle in your hands out into the trees as well. 

"I w-was...p-pretty sh-sheltered before I-"

You realized his stammering was becoming more severe and that usual playful, mischievous look on his face was gone. Fuck, you hadn't meant to do that to him. His past seemed bad, really bad, even though you knew nothing of it. All you knew was it was bad enough to send him running into the woods, away from everyone for years and years. You didn't want to pry anymore and you felt infinitely bad for reopening Toby's wound. Quickly, you tried to steer him away from the topic of his past. 

You stood up to move to the front of the stump, closer to him. "Well, anyways, what do you wanna watch? I bet I could try to find it..." 

The smile returned to his face. He seemed equally willing to dodge the subject of his history as well. You barely even noticed his exposed teeth this time. "You'll m-make fun of me," he said sheepishly, glancing off to the side, wiping off his hands on his pants and going back to the zipper of his bulky, fur hooded jacket. "Get u-up, I'm trying to make the stump c-comfy." 

Softly, your head tilted to the side as you looked up at him innocently and poked the toe of your shoe against his to get his attention. "If I get up will you tell me what movie? I won't make fun of you, on God." You held up a solemn hand, putting on the most serious expression you could muster. Toby gave a bit of a laugh before nodding his head, bringing the zipper all the way down. 

"F-fine." 

You sprang to your feet as he laid down the jack, pinning the heavy hood on top of the stump so it wouldn't fall down. You hadn't realized how much bigger the jacket really was, which made you think he might have stolen it from someone else who was larger than he. The revelation didn't come as much of a surprise to you--you were already well aware of Toby's little kleptomaniac habit, which he'd spread like a cold to you. 

He gestured to the covered stump, which you took as a silent request to sit back down again. You were surprised when you found that the jacket did well to render the feeling of rough bark to nothing at all. Toby crossed his arms, standing in front of you for a moment. He really was a lot smaller without that jacket, even in the thick sweater he wore beneath--slender and decently built with lean, hard earned muscle in his abdomen, chest, and arms.

 _Probably from chopping wood for so long_ , was what you thought. 

" _Star Wars_ ," he said. 

"What-" you replied, distracted as all hell.

He sat down next to you as you rubbed at your cheek with your palm, averting eye contact with him. You cleared your throat as he repeated himself. 

"S-so I was right before," you eventually said with a giggle. "You _are_ a DORK!" 

Toby put on a fake pout, obviously amused underneath it. "You prom-promised you wouldn't make fun of me," he whined, giving you a soft, barely-there punch to your arm. 

You rolled your eyes. "I'm just messing with you. Which one do you want?"

" _Revenge of the Sith_ ," he answered all too fast. "I u-used to try and watch it in my head like, fr-from memory but it's been so long since I've seen it." 

Hearing the strange sort of genuine sadness in his voice, you decided you were going to find him the best pirated version of that stupid fucking nerd movie your phone would allow. You were no stranger to pirating movies off the internet, so you figured it would be a breeze. However, your service in the woods was pretty shit, so you had to settle on a lesser quality version of the movie just to make sure it didn't buffer. 

But Toby didn't seem to care about that. In fact, he seemed infinitely grateful for the very little effort and patience you were putting into all of this. He pulled you closer so he could see the phone screen better. You couldn't help but lean into him, finding his body heat somewhat comforting. 

Toby talked throughout the whole fucking movie. 

It was a habit you usually had found annoying in other people (at least when you were still hanging out with other people). But...not with him. If anything, you thought it was kinda cute. You thought his commentary made the movie better anyways because you didn't care that much about it. You just wanted him to enjoy it. Sometimes he explained certain plot points or characters to you in excruciating detail. It was kinda charming, watching him have such intense passion and nostalgia for something so silly. 

Eventually, about halfway through the movie, your hand began to get a bit shaky and fidgety after holding the phone for so long. Toby took notice of this and reached out, grabbing your phone with a gloved hand. He propped up one of his knees and balanced the phone on it. 

You could tell it was an attempt to make you more comfortable, but his own tics began to jerk the phone slightly. Gently, you reached out once more with your other, not numb arm, and grabbed the other side of the phone to steady it. He didn't say anything, but seemed happy that you were helping him hold up the phone. You hoped your arm would stay locked in the position as you yawned, feeling drowsier and drowsier. At some point, your head leaned into the crook of his neck, your eyes half open to watch the flickering light on your phone screen. 

He was quiet now as he watched the movie, but it didn't feel awkward. Just a comfortable silence. You thought you might have felt his arm around your shoulders. You didn't shrug it off. 

He was safe.

Toby was safe.

You knew you'd never feel those hands from so long ago wrapped around your neck ever again. Not in real life and not in your dreams. 

Not as long as you stayed with him. 

And God, oh God, if only you could see the way he looked at you. Like you were the only thing in his world.


	5. carry to

It didn't take long for petty little crimes, the guilty pleasures and thrills the two of you indulged in began to escalate. You told yourself one day you'd put your foot down when it became too much. But every now and then, you got tangled in the moment, and lost your footing. 

You'd nudged him one night in the minimart, gaining his attention. You'd angled your head slightly towards a shelf in one of the fridges, the section with cheap beers and seltzers to be specific. He'd raised an eyebrow at you, one of his hands coming untucked from his jacket pocket.

"Come on..." you told him, your shoulder finding his side again as you gave him a sultry, sly glance. "Let's liven things up a little tonight..."

"Aren't you-you, like, nineteen?" Toby shot back, giving you a playful jab in the ribs. 

He turned his full attention on you, poking at your ribs when he realized how sensitive they were until you managed to bat his hands away and grab onto his wrists to keep him from wrestling with you. You fixed him with your gaze and he jerked under your grip a little bit. 

"Yeah? So what? I've been to parties before--I've drank and stuff." 

Toby scoffed as you finally released his hands. "No need to flex then, let's go," he said, giving you a good natured shrug and turning towards the fridge while you busied yourself in the aisle across from the walls of glass doors. You knew any cameras in the store normally malfunctioned (at least that's what Toby told you happened when he was around, with no further explanation as usual), but you still liked to be careful on the off chance he was fucking with you or just trying to impress you.

You still thought he was too good to be true. 

And Toby? Well, Toby was just happy he'd finally have someone else to drink with for the first time in years. He'd stolen alcohol before, when there was nothing else risky enough to take. But soon drinking alone and waking up hungover, once again all alone, became too much for him and he curbed his excessive drinking before it really went south. It made his head pound more than it usually did anyways, so he figured it wasn't worth it originally. The pounding was the worst. Of course he couldn't feel the pain he knew it was supposed to be causing, but he could feel the neutral, never ending, monotonous pounding. 

It was enough to put him off it entirely.

But for you? _With_ you? This time it would be worth it. 

Toby eased the door open quietly, pulled the beers from the top shelf, and softly closed it. The cashier across the store, as usual, didn't look up. Dozing off again. Even so, he still noticed that you'd positioned your body in a way where you were partially blocking Toby from what would have been the cashier's line of sight if their head was upright. He felt a bit of a glow before shoving the six pack under his bulky jacket. 

You grabbed a pack of gum from the aisle you'd been pretending to care so much about. It was an easy trick--the first one Toby taught you. Buy something small, and taking things for free is even easier and you look less suspicious than you would walking out without buying anything. 

The cashier seemed to start awake as you approached the register, putting the gum up on the counter and tucking your hands into your pocket to fish out a dollar. To your complete and utter displeasure, the cashier started actually talking to you, attempting to flirt. It was like he didn't even notice Toby. 

_All men,_ was the only thought that really crossed your head as you ignored most of what he was saying.

At some point however, he'd clearly pissed off Toby. When the cashier went to hand you back your change, Toby intercepted, grabbed it, and hurled the few coins back at him. Some of them bounced off the guy's head and the others scattered behind the register. "K-Keep the change, asshole," Toby snapped at him, grabbing your gum off the counter.

Toby's free arm wrapped tight around you as he began to rush you out of the store. 

"Ok-kay let's blow th-this _fucking_ popstand," he said briskly, as you stared at him, nothing but complete entertainment and even a little bit of shock clear on your face. You would have talked, had you not glimpsed the actual anger on his face and he pulled you down the slope with him. All the sudden it wasn't as funny anymore. 

He'd pulled his mouthguard back up over his face and pushed his lenses back to the bridge of his crooked, scarred nose. At some point, he pulled the six pack of beers out from underneath his coat, idly carrying them in his free hand so he could continue to almost hold you closer. You didn't mind that at first, it was a bit cold out, after all. However, you grew a bit nervous upon remembering that look of genuine fury on his face. Had that cashier really made him _that_ mad? Was he mad at you for letting it happen? Were you starting to shake? Should you have called this all off and gone home? 

He didn't stop until you were back into the woods with him, and he didn't talk to you again until the two of you reached the stump that you'd grown so familiar with. His arm fell from your waist and you put a bit of distance between yourself and him, wrapping your arms around yourself. You didn't really know what to say or do. Even though you'd thought of a million different things on the way over. 

Gently, he set down the carton on the stump. Toby gestured to it, his arm jerking obviously. Wow, he really was worked up. He hadn't had tics this violent around you for a pretty long time. All the sudden you felt bad. If you were gonna end up stressing him out this bad-

"So-sorry," he said suddenly. "For what happened. Back th-there. I didn't li-like what he was say-saying to you." 

"It's...fine," you said, although you really didn't feel that way.

"N-no it isn't. You're sca-scared again. You got thh-that look in your eyes." He pulled down his mouthguard and shifted his orange-tinted lenses back over his curly locks--something he knew usually made you feel more at ease with him. 

A nervous laugh still left you, a bitter attempt at relieving some of the tension in the air. "Am I _that_ easy to read now?"

Toby shrugged. He went to take a beer from the carton. You drew closer and went to take one too. Maybe it would ease your nerves-

Toby suddenly reached for the handle of the six pack and hoisted it high above his head. You flinched at first before realizing he was trying to mess around with you again. Might as well take the opportunity. Suddenly, you reached up for it, breathing a secret and silent sigh of relief that he seemed back to his usual, playful antics. "Easy there," he told you, cocking his head a bit to the side. "You're not twenty one yet, s-so nooo drinking for you. This is allll for m-me, babe." 

Your fingers got close to clipping the bottom of the bottles and Toby suddenly lifted it higher, rising to the toes of his boots. Playing along, you put a hand on his chest and stepped on his feet, still making a show of reaching up towards the bottles. Your hand shifted to his shoulder as you tried to push him down.

"Listen here, _BABE_ ," you shot back, finding your confidence again. "I was _this_ close to flashing that fucking greaseball cashier just so he wouldn't look over at you and catch you jamming a fucking six pack under your stupid, musty, and might I add VERY SUSPICIOUS jacket." 

He gave your cheek a bit of an over exaggerated, obnoxious pat and you smacked at his hand again. "Fair enough," he said, his usual half smirk probably plastered on his face from the way his eyes crinkled up. "You did help. A little. Just a smi-smi-" he seemed to give up on the word he was trying to say and pick another one. "Just a tiny bit." 

Time to pull out the big guns. You whined a little, pouting visibly to Toby's sheer entertainment. "Come onnnnn," you droned, squeezing his shoulder, hoping you were annoying him. "Pleaseeeeeee."

"But it's-" Toby let out a mock gasp, glancing melodramatically back and forth before leaning forward to whisper into your ear. " _Illegal!_ " 

You knew he was referencing your reaction to the first time he stole something in front of you, which you actually thought was cute that he remembered. Still you rolled your eyes, giving another big reach up in the direction of the alcohol. "We deadass just STOLE AGAIN--don't be a pussy, gimme some or I'll cry." 

"Wow were you in t-the debate team in high school be-because those are some absolutely _s-stellar_ points you're making right now."

"That is the _WORST_ pickup line, hands _down_ , I've ever heard." 

Toby laughed, shifting his feet out from under yours. He finally lowered the six pack. "It's not one, but I feel bad for y-you thinking that it was. Have a beer for your troubles."   
  
He picked a bottle out of you, popping the cap off with the rough, hard edge of the stump and offering it to you. You took it, and being fairly new to this brand, took an experimental sip. It wasn't too bad so you decided that overall your little trip to the store with Toby was a success. He popped off the cap on his bottle as well, not paying attention to the foam that coasted over his hand for a brief moment. Letting out a sigh, he sat down on the stump, patting the spot next to him. You obeyed and cozied up against him once more.

You thought it was kinda strange how he could go from being a cold, scary stranger to you to a warm, gentle companion that you wanted to spend all night with. But it was something you could ignore. You could excuse it. 

After a bit of drinking and a long, comfortable silence, you spoke again.

"I wanna take a picture of us," you said, gesturing to your phone. Toby shrugged in a 'why not' sort of manner. But then he went to pull his mouthguard up. 

Gently, you grabbed his wrist, looking up at him as you did. He froze, looking back down at you for a long moment before slowly, surely, your hand crept up further over his own. You gave his hand a light squeeze, and he squeezed back before letting his hand drop away. The dark fabric shifted back down to pool at his beauty-marked, scarred neck. 

You smiled at him before wrapping an arm around his shoulders so you could get him closer in the frame with you. You held up your phone and he seemed to take your queue to smile before you snapped one, single picture. Strangely enough, it came out good and you were already feeling a little bit too tipsy to bother retaking it. 

He took your phone gently from your hand, something only he seemed to be able to do without seeming invasive, and looked closer at the photo.

"Th-that's some high definition," he remarked, zooming in on certain spots, just to marvel at the quality. You liked seeing him like this, eyes all wide and curious, observing something new that he'd missed out on living all alone out in the woods. It was the saddest thing in the world almost. 

Toby looked back to you, handing your phone back with a bit of a smirk. "You know you-you got _just_ like...these really pretty eyes." His thumb found your chin, twitching softly against it, as he tilted your head slightly. You brushed his hand away.

"Oh shut the fuck upppp," you said, unable to hide your smile, hoping that it was dim enough so Toby wouldn't be able to see the heated flush he induced upon your face. 

"N-no, I'm being se-serious," he insisted. 

You scoffed again, brushing off his not so slick attempt at flirting. He'd been doing it a lot more lately and if you were honest with yourself...you didn't really mind it that much. Half the time he ironically flirted with you anyways, so sometimes it proved to be entertaining. 

"Whatever, let's listen to your stupid band that you like so much," you eventually blurted out in response, not really knowing what else to say to him.

He had no objection to that idea as you untangled your headphones (something that was harder and harder to do with every swig from the bottle you took) and let Toby take over from there. Once again, you leaned upon his shoulder, one bud in your ear and the other in his. The two of you sat there for what might have been hours, drinking and listening to the music. 

When you had drank previously at parties, you found that the alcohol tended to depress you--which was part of the reason you weren't really much for it casually. But with him, it somehow made you wild. Like he was a drug you weren't supposed to have been taking with alcohol. And weirdly enough, you seemed to have the same effect on him.

What you could only have described at the time as being a manic high overtook you. And it felt good.

At some point, when you were probably at your most wasted, you were up against a tree, with an empty bottle balanced on your head. 

You couldn't really help that you were a lightweight. Toby wasn't doing much better considering how low his tolerance had gotten. 

"Try to hit the bottle w-with your axe, pretty boy," you'd slurred out, one hand against the tree bark to keep some semblance of balance. The bottle nearly fell off your head as you adjusted your stance and you quickly rebalanced it. 

Toby stood maybe twenty feet away with his hatchets in hand. He looked between the two, apparently deciding on his favorite one (it had a nick in it, which he told you was from fighting a 'totally sick' bear). He flipped it in his hand with ease a few times, catching it firmly by the base despite his apparent impairment. 

"Alright," he told you, pushing his shades back down over his face, like it helped him aim. "Wa-watch this." 

He drew back and went to hurl it above your head, but seemed to hesitate beforehand. Apparently, it threw his aim off, as the blade ended up embedded only inches away from the side of your head. For a moment, the two of you just stood there, dull in the silence. What were you waiting for?

You broke down into laughter, slow at first, before reaching an almost scary extreme. The beer bottle fell from your head as you almost sank to the ground, knees bent. The bottle hit a rock and shattered. 

Your laughter faded. "You missed...you missed." And then you stared at him for another few, long, silent second before you burst into sudden tears. Soft sobs jerked at your chest, taking the place of the previous giggles.

Toby clicked his tongue, taking your tears as an invitation to come closer. "Aw, c'mereee," he murmured to you as he bent down slightly to gather you up in his arms. You couldn't help but cry incessantly into his chest for seemingly no reason as he carried you over to the stump and sat down, pushing the rest of the empty bottles off of it and to the ground to make room for your legs when he swung you over and pulled you down into his lap. 

Between your slurring and intoxication and his own dizzy drunkenness, Toby had a bit of trouble trying to understand whatever it was you were sobbing about. All he could focus on at that moment was how nicely you seemed to fit onto his lap, like you belonged there. If it were up to him he could have stayed like that forever with you.

But then he started picking up a few words from you here and there. And then sentences. And he started to listen, stiffening and sitting up straighter the more and more he heard. An ex-boyfriend. Who hurt you. His blood seemed to boil. His fingers pressed tighter against your skin. 

"-know why I walk at ni-night?" was about where he tuned in. Another sob shook you before you could continue. "O-once when I slept, he-he tried to...to strangle me. He tried to kill me. In-in my sleep." You gathered another shaking breath, something that was proving difficult as your breath violent hitched in your throat. "A-and every time I start drifting off to go to sleep...I just...I feel his _hands..."_ Slowly, your hands crept up to Toby's throat, wrapping around it as you tilted your head back clumsily, looking up at him through half-lidded, reddened eyes. 

And all the sudden you were kissing him, even with the heavy scars on his face and his torn lips, you were _kissing_ him. Your palms were now gentle against his neck, which was also covered in heavy burn scars. Toby was stunned at first, trying to hold on to his feelings of rage for later and instead focus on the utter euphoria flooding through his system. No, he couldn't truly feel your touch, but he connected the pressure of your lips and fingers against him, the push of your tongue in his mouth, to the fantasies and ideas he had of you that usually worked him up into a tizzy. His _idea_ of you was that of pure pleasure, and that was all he needed.

Still, unused to the new type of attention, Toby froze up. But as you continued on, seemingly unfazed by the stiffness of his muscles, kissing along his rough jawline, he relaxed. He wrapped his arms around you tighter kissing you back briefly, his heart beating, hard, in his chest. 

And finally, after what felt like a blissful eternity to Toby, you broke away from him, giving a deep, still shaking sigh. Your nose and forehead pressed against his momentarily as you rested, limp in his arms. 

"You should wash your hair," you murmured to him, your eyes closed. 

He smiled. "I did," he replied carelessly. "Two weeks ago in a stream."

You giggled and then sighed again, a sound that Toby would forever love on his ears. His hands rubbed slightly at your arms and your head dipped slightly, like you were beginning to nod off. One of his hands went to support the back of your head as you yawned. In the moonlight, he could catch glimpses of tears still trailing down your face. 

"I-I'm really tired, Toby," you told him softly. "I'm gonna...I'm gonna take just a little nap." 

Toby couldn't quite catch the rest of whatever else you happened to drunkenly mutter. It didn't matter to him anyways, as he focused on shifting you into a more comfortable position in his arms so you could doze off easier. Almost instantly, you seemed to fall asleep on top of him. He wondered how tired you really were. 

He figured you wouldn't quite want to spend the night sleeping in the woods with him. Not yet, anyways, he was sure he could get you to the point soon, though. But for now, your bed would have to do. It was closer by than his anyways. 

Although you were out like a light, Toby was still careful and gentle when he stood up off the trunk, hoisting you up in his arms, making sure your head was nestled into his chest comfortably. He was well aware of where your house was--he could have literally walked there with you in his arms, eyes shut, no problem and find it. After all, he'd followed you back to it many times before, way before you even had met him that fateful night in the forest. He remembered there were many times where he was sure he fucked up and you had caught sight of him. But no. You always walked like you were the only one left in the world, eyes troubled and dark.

And now he knew exactly what it was that troubled your mind. That kept you out late at night. That drove you to him, to his woods. 

He knew all the best vantage points to see you from the best of angles in the windows of your house as well. Sometimes, when he got bold and you were away, he'd broken in a few times, just trying to figure out...what your whole deal was. He liked have something to fawn over, to be fascinated by. Something new to interest him. Something that he could treasure and pursue...maybe not immediately snuff out like every other person he had come across before. 

Never in his wildest dreams could he have imagined that he would carry you to your house rather than away from it, into the woods with him. 

But here he was.

Maybe he didn't have to carry you away like he'd fantasized about for night and nights at a time. Maybe you'd _want_ to come with him, your hand in his, like you'd been doing again and again. Like you'd done all those nights ago when you'd first met him. You'd been so willing...

Things had a funny way of working out.

It almost felt like old times to Toby as he nudged open your door (which you'd thankfully left unlocked before coming out to meet with him on this night). Easily, he brought you up the stairs and to your room, like he'd lived in the house himself at your side. In a way, he felt he had. This was his home too, as long as you were there. 

Gently, he laid you down in your bed. Upon feeling soft mattress beneath you, you shifted slightly and murmured a little bit, stretching out half consciously. Toby thought you kinda looked like an angel with your hair all out and your limbs reached out across the pure white sheets. 

Toby leaned down to kiss your cheek. A soft moan escaped your lips as you shifted. He brought the blankets near the base of the bed up to your shoulders, his hand stroking over your head softly. Still leaned down towards you, he spoke.

"One la-last thing..." he said, his voice quiet, his breath warm against your neck as he brushed some of your hair behind your ear delicately. "What's. His. Name." 

Your lips parted slightly to give him a slurred answer. 

But an answer all the same.


	6. see me

The first thing to greet you when you awoke was a splitting headache and a strange sense of sadness--of regret. For a moment, you simply laid there in bed, arms reaching above your head to grab a pillow and pull it over your face. A heavy sigh eventually left you as you reached to the bedside nightstand, feeling around for your phone. You moved the pillow from your face when you couldn't feel the cracked screen or case. 

Your phone was gone. 

Another long, exasperated groan left you as you threw yourself back onto the mattress, stretching out once more and turning on your side. 

_Fuck. Must have left it in the woods. Or something. If it's not here Toby probably has it._

To be honest, you could have been completely wrong considering most of last night felt like a blur. After a quick trip to the bathroom which you spent hanging over porcelain, wishing there was someone to hold back your hair, you filled a glass of water and downed it. Somehow the sun seemed even brighter than normal.

It was early morning. Weird. Normally you slept in pretty late, so it was odd looking out the window and seeing everything bathed in that strange dawn light. 

Would it be weird to go back to the forest _this_ early? Would Toby think you were weird or something? Probably not and you found yourself feeling kind of dumb for thinking that. Weird? Weird was whatever the hell you had going on with him in the first place. 

_Toby might not even have my phone..._

But phone or not you knew you still wanted to see him again. 

It was a weekend anyways, it wasn't like you had anything else to do. Maybe it'd be nice to surprise him.

You didn't really know where Toby went during the daytime or where he went when he wasn't with you, but you decided that going to your normal meeting spot was a decent start. Obviously, the two of you had absolutely decimated that six pack of beer, so maybe he was blacked out somewhere nearby. As you walked, you managed to scrape together a bit of an idea of what had happened. You knew that at some point you'd convinced him to throw his hatchet at you and you knew that he'd been getting equally as shitfaced as you.

Weird how he was a lightweight like yourself, despite being much bigger than you. Maybe he didn't drink often--you weren't exactly sure. Maybe he could help you piece together the rest of the night. You didn't remember how you got back to your house, and you knew he'd never have let you wander drunk and alone in the dark back to your house, so chances were he probably walked you back. 

Eventually you managed to find the familiar stump that marked the clearing. Even though you'd seen it before in the daylight a long time ago, it didn't seem any less eerie. You tucked your hands in your pockets a bit anxiously, craning your neck so you could get a better look around. 

Empty bottles littered the ground. You kicked them aside as you wandered about. Eventually, you caught a glimpse of your phone case somewhere in the pine needles and knelt to take it. The headphones were nearby, tangled, but overall fine. You bunched them up in your palm before shoving them into your back pocket. When you glanced back down to where you'd found your headphones, you noticed broken, out of place branches and stirred dirt. You squinted your eyes and knelt back down to get a better look. There seemed to be remnants of some footprints, pine needles pushed up all around them like someone had been slipping and struggling to get their balance back. 

_Fuck, did Toby really get_ that _wasted?_

And then you saw the blood. 

It could have been mistaken for darker spots in the dirt if you hadn't been observant enough. But glistening red, yet to be dried, on the broken branches and pine needles nearby gave it away. Sunlight glinting off of a broken bottle caught your eye. The edges also were darkened with blood. 

If you squinted harder, you could make out a faint blood trail among the glass shards scattered amongst the ground. Your breath caught in your throat when you began to fully process the gravity of your findings. 

_What the fuck? Did Toby get hurt? Or attacked or something? Like by an animal maybe? Where the fuck did he even go?_

But as you followed the trail, you could only remind yourself that there were no animal prints among the exposed dirt. Just shoes. You bit the inside of your cheek, your hand tight around your phone. Every so often, you'd lose the trail and consider turning around and giving up. But a sense of dread pushed you onwards, and your curiosity only seemed to grow. God, you were scared. 

When you couldn't see blood spatter anymore, you'd simply follow the dragging trails and larger broken branches. Had someone dragged him off? He seemed to have put up one hell of a fight. You didn't know what would be worse--finding him or not. There only seemed to be more and more blood appearing the further you pressed on.

And then you saw him. Toby. Hunched over, standing with more weight on his right leg, his head twitching to the side repeatedly and a bit violently. He was shaking bad, making various noises under his breath, muttering phrases you couldn't understand repeatedly. In his jerking hands were his hatchets, both of the blades coated in fresh, glistening red. 

It was like being plunged in ice, watching him, his chest heaving. You couldn't move and your fingers only seemed to tighten to the point of losing feeling around your phone. 

There was a body in front of him with plenty of gore to match. 

A body you recognized. 

He seemed to fall suddenly still, like the same ice that swept over you had finally come for him. He knew you were there. He didn't have to say it, he didn't have to show it for you to realize. Time seemed to resume as he slowly turned, his violent twitches returning, either of his hatchets still gripped tight in his stained hands.   
  
A hand went to your mouth--something to muffle the strange noise of confusion and fear that has slipped from your lips. And you shut your eyes, tightly, hoping that when you opened them the body would be gone and Toby wouldn't be covered in blood... You could hear pine needles crunching under Toby's boots as he approached you. Slowly, you shook your head. 

"What the _fuck_ did you _do_ , Toby?" you whispered through your fingers, your voice raspy, breaking, harsh. "What _the fuck_ did you do?" 

He was still breathing heavy, you could hear it. You opened your eyes, not realizing how close he was. He'd lifted his orange lenses up to rest upon his brow. And when you looked into his eyes, it was like he was hollow. He wasn't him. 

Toby took another step closer. You instinctually lurched back. Tears were gathering in your eyes--burning hot at the corners, threatening to spill over. 

_"Wha-what the fuck did you do, Toby?"_ you asked again, the desperation pitching your voice even higher, your throat beginning to tighten. "W-Why?"   
  
He looked at you, his eyes dark and gaunt. "You're no-not su-supposed to be-be here. You-you're supposed to-to be in bed suh-still." His tics and stammers seemed to be even worse now. He had to pause as a series of violent twitches and incoherent mutterings escaped him. "Th-this is all wrong..."

He was distressed...a-and angry and clearly unstable. 

You'd never seen that look on his face before. 

It scared you. 

For a moment, his voice became steady.

"And now you've seen me." 

Tears began to roll down your cheeks and it felt like the forest was falling all around you. You wanted to vomit, you wanted to collapse, you wanted to fall screaming and crying. All men. All fucking men. Was it you? Was it you? Was it your fault you'd let yourself trust another man who'd once again gone and fucked **everything** up--who ruined **everything**. 

The body only a few feet away, appearing mauled and brutalized on the ground, was that of the last man you'd let yourself love. The last man you'd let yourself trust. And now here you were before his killer. The second man you'd been fucking stupid enough to trust, maybe even...maybe even loved too. 

Of fucking course. You were so fucking **stupid.**

You should have seen it, you should have seen the red flags. 

Hatchets.

The fucking _hatchets._

When the _fuck_ had you ever even _seen_ him chop wood? It was a lie. A shoddy lie you'd eaten up so eagerly. He planned to do this. Toby killed someone. Toby fucking killed someone. He dragged them through the woods and made them suffer and scream and struggle until he slaughtered them.

_And he's done it before. He's killed people before,_ you realized suddenly, his reaction to being found with the body finally registering with you. 

You couldn't stop yourself from once again glancing at the body, before instantly regretting it once again. Your stomach seemed to turn as you hunched over slightly. 

"You're...you're worse than him," you choked out, when your head finally stopped spinning. 

_How the fuck could I have been so_ stupid _?! Give the weirdo in the woods a chance--he helped you didn't he? He's just some guy in the woods, right? Fucking wrong. Fucking stupid that's what I am- I'm so fucking stupid for thinking...for thinking..._ you looked at Toby once again, your eyes blurry with tears, your legs feeling weaker and weaker. "I actually liked you. I liked you. I...I wanted to be with you," you said, your thoughts accidentally spilling over. Shame washed over you at the confession. 

Toby reached out to touch you. You jerked away and took another step back, taking in a sobbing, shaking breath. 

"I was so fucking stupid for letting myself trust someone like you. I was so fucking stupid for thinking maybe I'd finally...I'd finally met someone good. But I was wrong. I was so, so fucking wrong, you know tha-that? Because all I'm ever good for is falling in love with fucking MONSTERS like you-"

"It wa-wasn't supposed to-to go-" another series of jerks and uncontrollable words quickly came from him. "It wasn't supposed to go li-like this." For a second, a more human emotion crossed his scarred face and his eyebrows seemed to contort. He seemed even more distressed now, desperate maybe. "Not-not...like this."   
  
You hadn't realized how much harder you were crying. You pushed a palm across your eyes, trying to rub the tears away as more sobs choked you. "Well it _did_ ," you eventually managed. 

Once again, Toby took another slow step closer to you. His eyes were all cold again. Those three words seemed to have infuriated him in a way you couldn't understand. When you flinched once again and took another few steps away, he really seemed to snap.

"No-now you're afraid of me?? I did-did you a fu-fucking favor! I-I ki-ki-killed the man who hurt you the mo-most. S-so he can _never_ fucking hurt you _ag-again._ And this-" he gestured outwards, either one of his hands still brandishing his bloody hatchets. His head rolled slightly before he focused back on you. His voice became icy and venomous, piercing even through the dark mask covering half his face. " _This_ is the thanks I get??"   
  
Before you could even open your mouth to reply, he lurched forwards and grabbed your wrist. You tried to pull away. You didn't even know why you bothered. Because you knew he wasn't going to let go. 

"You're a fucking MURDERER!" you finally snapped, your raspy whispers turning to screams, the tension becoming too much for you to bear. " **YOU KILLED SOMONE TOBY!"**

Toby scoffed and rolled his eyes, drawing you in closer. "Oh PLEASE, he was an e-evil fu-fucking man. He de-deserved to die. Ju-just like the others..." 

You cried out when his grip suddenly tightened on you. Every new word he said seemed to hurt as well. "You're a MONSTER," you screamed out, trying once again to pull away from him, struggling with everything you had. "Let me go! Let me _the fuck_ go!" 

His bloodied hands found your shoulders and he gripped tighter onto you. Furiously, he was shaking you now, his face inches from yours as he shouted, loud enough to scare the birds nesting in the trees above.

**"All I EVER wanted to d-do was HELP you!"** A frustrated scream of his own escaped him. One of his hands suddenly gripped your jaw, his fingers digging into your cheek. The iron reek of blood on him was so powerful it made you dizzy. **"YOU'RE MY PASSION! YOU BECAME MY PASSION-"**

In a fit of rage, he threw you to the ground. You landed oddly on your side and let out a scream of pain. Your phone fell from your hand, slipping amongst the pine needles and back onto the forest floor. When you turned onto your back to throw your hands up to defend yourself, you caught a glimpse of Toby raising one of his hatchets. The early, dry sun caught the blood among the blade hauntingly as you sobbed at his feet. 

Twitching violently, he put the blade to your chin, dangerously close to your soft throat. His arm began to shake worse and worse as his head rolled and he let out a series of frustrated groans. It seemed like he was about to move to slit your throat, before unpredictably hurling the hatchet to the side, the blade making its home within the bark of a nearby tree. He gasped for breath, his chest heaving once again.

"Get the f-fuck up. Get the FUCK up," he snarled as you trembled on the ground before him, tears cutting clean lines through the new dirt and blood stains Toby had left upon your face. 

In shock, you could only lay helplessly before him, gasping for breath. His shaking hands wrapped around your forearms, yanking you up to your feet. His hands once again slid down to your wrist to hold you, leaving long smears of your ex's blood along your skin. 

And silently, eerily--he stared at you, frozen, like every single motion was pain to him. He really did look like he was in agony, hurting more than he was angry. You hadn't realized he'd begun to cry until you were up close to him. His pain didn't show in his voice. It didn't show in his violent actions. 

It seemed like he suddenly couldn't stand looking at you any longer, as he suddenly shoved you away. You stumbled before grabbing a tree to stabilize yourself, leaning up against it completely as a shaking sigh escaped you. Your head hung as your hands shook, your brows contorting as you bit back another sob. 

The silence seemed to last an eternity before Toby broke it again.

"Get...get the fu-fuck out. Now. Ju-just fucking go. And d-don't come back. D-don't _ever_ come back here. D-don't _ever_ come back into these woods again or I'm go-going to kill you. Ju-just like _He_ told me to MONTHS ago." 

You didn't need to hear another word from Toby.

You ran.


	7. stupid fucking glasses

It'd been a month since you'd last seen him. Him and the body in the woods. You didn't dare go to the cops, knowing the chance of you getting linked to the murder of your repeatedly abusive ex would be high. If you told them about the boy in the woods with the strange glasses and the scars, you'd more than likely be placed in a ward than in a courtroom to testify against him. You didn't want to see him again anyways. Courtroom or not. 

You just wanted to pretend nothing happened. You wanted to move on and pretend he was just a night time dream. An illusion you'd made up for your own comfort. Every day you told yourself he wasn't real--he never was--in an attempt to manipulate yourself into believing it. A strange coping mechanism, but a coping mechanism nonetheless. 

Almost like punishment for bearing witness to the body of the dead and loving the man who took the life, your night terrors returned again, worse somehow. There was the usual. Hands around your neck, breath leaving your body as you struggled helplessly. But now there was that tall, faceless entity showing up as well. Disembodied hands. And that was it. You could never remember the little details and you didn't want to--out of fear of what it would do to your psyche. And you didn't dare go out into the woods to walk and soothe your racing mind, like you once found comfort in doing.

Those were _his_ woods now. If you stepped foot in them again you truly believe he'd make good on his previous promise to have you join your ex in the grave. 

You had no choice but to break and finally get a prescription for some powerful sedatives. In the end, you found yourself guiltily wondering why you hadn't gone through without before. Probably because your nightmares hadn't been terrifying enough and your insomnia afterwards hadn't been bad enough to finally push you to call your therapist and set up an appointment in the first place. You'd been careful not to let any mention of _him_ slip. Just the details of the night terrors and your symptoms that was _it_.

Nobody needed to know anything else but you, God forbid. 

The pills worked like a charm. Every night you slipped with ease into a peaceful, deep black where there were no men to terrorize you, strangle you, stare into you. The first morning you woke up after taking them, you'd nearly cried out of pure relief. Still, you knew to be wary, not wanting to become addicted to the pills either, as much as you often thought of how much easier it'd be to pop as many as you wanted in case by some strange, irrational case you were unable to sleep the next day. You tried to keep anxious thoughts like that controlled as much as you could. 

You thought you'd finally be okay. 

Until one night, when you were getting ready for bed. It'd been hot out, with an uncomfortable tinge of humid, so you'd opened the window in hopes of catching any sort of night breeze. To keep yourself from overheating during your blackout-esque sleeps, you'd chosen to only wear an oversized shirt to bed. Between that and freshly shaven, moisturized legs, you were actually pretty excited to get between the mattress and the sheets of your bed. It felt good that you were finally making an attempt to somewhat pamper yourself and you figured it was the first small step to finally, _finally_ , being happy. Maybe you'd even go out tomorrow and meet up with your friends--who you hadn't seen in months. 

_Fuck yeah, tonight's gonna be such a good fucking sleep..._

And then, a rustling sound came from just beneath the window, like something moving through tree leaves. And it wasn't wind. No...this force was violent and desperate--nothing like the usual breezes that'd been blowing into your room so gently. Your smile had dropped instantly, and you quickly turned from the window to the nightstand. Shakily, you'd yanked open the drawer, pulling out the small switchblade you'd began to keep in there for safety. You tried to ignore the shaking in your hands. Because you already knew what it was at the window.

Toby.

He was crawling through, his gloved hands tight on the windowsill, his shoulders hunched so he could fit through the small space. 

To say you were absolutely petrified was an understatement. 

He'd been sitting at first, on the edge of the wood, getting some footing and his balance back. Then he looked up at you, standing up completely, his hands leaving the windowsill. He remained still, except for a few stray twitches. One of his hatchets was strapped to his back and the other one was no where in sight, which made you a bit relieved. Less hatchets meant less danger. Although he could probably kill you just as easy with only one. He seemed to be waiting for you to do something first and you saw his eyes dart down to observe the blade in your hand, gripped so tight your knuckles were turning white.

Finally, you found the words. 

"What are you fucking _doing_ here?" you'd hissed, venomously. Just when you thought you were getting better. Just when you thought everything was going to be okay again. _He_ just had to show up. 

And you'd be lying if you said there wasn't some part of you, buried deep down inside that wasn't thrilled to see him come back into your life and ruin absolutely fucking everything. 

When he didn't answer and simply ducked his head, you found the confidence to march right up to him, your switchblade tight in your hand still. The tension had not left your body, despite how secretly (and guiltily) pleased you were to see him. **_No._** You didn't _want_ to see him at all. You wanted him gone. You were finally getting your life together again and he couldn't be anywhere near you for that to happen. 

Toby was no good for you. 

But nothing you wanted was ever good for you, was it? 

Still, your words were harsh--maybe in an attempt to convince yourself to pick a side in your mind and end the inner turmoil, the toxic indecision that was going to eat you alive from the inside out. 

"Get the fuck out right _fucking_ now. I never want to see you ever fucking again," you'd spat at him. He was here to kill you. He had to be. There was no other reason, you tried to convince yourself. Why else did he still have that single hatchet with him? Of course he was here to murder you. That's what killers like him did. He'd done it before and he was going to do it again and it was going to be your skin under the blade this time. 

You suddenly found it hard to breathe. 

"(Y/N)," he finally spoke, his voice strangely soft. There was no murderous anger in it. None on his contorting facial expressions either. "B-Be reasonable, put do-own the knife." 

Your eyes narrowed. Somehow him talking to you like that made you even angrier and more afraid--rather than soothing you like he'd probably meant for it to do. You didn't _want_ to be soothed by him. You wanted to be angry at him. You wanted him to get the fuck out of your house. You wanted him to leave you alone.

_No good for me. No good for me. Force him out before he sinks his claws in any fucking deeper and makes this any fucking harder. He killed someone. Never fucking forget he killed someone and he'll kill me too. He said he would--he will. He fucking will if I don't make him back off._

You didn't back down. The knife stayed clenched in your hand. 

The nerve you'd been so quick and eager to gather nearly vanished on the spot when Toby's own dark eyes narrowed as well behind sunset tinted glasses. How could he look at you like that? Why did it hurt so fucking much? He went to move towards you, and fear iced over you. He was close. Too close for your comfort. 

"Give me th-the-" he began before he unexpectedly went to grab the switchblade from your hand. His gloved fingers wrapped tightly around your wrist and panic surged through you, as well as a shot of adrenaline. 

_What the fuck is he going to do to me, what the_ fuck _is he going to do?!_

Terrified, you'd gone to yank your wrist out of his grip in vain. You knew how strong he was. You knew the only way you were going to get away from him was if he wanted you to in the first place. But still, you fought him, struggling to keep your balance and hand tight around the switchblade as he shoved you about. Your back had hit the wall at least twice, harder than the time before as you squirmed beneath his weight. He was trying to pry your aching fingers off the handle of the blade and hold onto you at the same time. Toby continually avoided grabbing at your throat, despite all the opportunities he had to do so. You figured it you had been more focused on fighting back against him instead of observing his strange mannerisms, you wouldn't have somehow ended falling back onto your own bed, with him heavy over top of you.

Still, you didn't stop writhing beneath him, trying to break his grip on you as a series of strained grunts came from him. At some point, your arm had knocked his glasses off and onto the bed, and your fingers had teared part of his mouthguard down in an attempt to shove his head away. It was a losing fight, obviously, it had been from the beginning, but now even more so that he was seconds away from having you pinned and helpless underneath him. Eventually, he succeeded in grabbing either one of your wrists, pushing them above your head, into the mattress, his grip tight with obvious irritation. His chest heaved with heavy exhales--apparently he'd not been expecting you to push back as hard as you did. Yours did as well, exhaustion and fear forcing your stomach into knots as your fingers clenched into angry fists and tears gathered in your eyes. 

Toby's scarred lips parted and it sounded as though he was about to say something.

You didn't want to hear it. 

Realizing you still had full movement of your lower body, you kneed him as hard as you could between his legs. A shout of pain escaped him and he lost his grip momentarily on you, giving you a window of opportunity you'd been hoping for. Quickly, you sat up and shoved him off the bed and to the ground, giving him a kick for good measure as well. 

Despite being unable to regain your breath, you still found your ability to yell.

"GET THE FUCK OUT OR I'LL CALL THE COPS, ON FUCKING _GOD_ , TOBY, I FUCKING MEAN IT!" you'd screamed at him, glaring at him as he stumbled to his feet and backed away from the bed, his hands up defenselessly. How fucking manipulative of him. 

"Fucking-fuck bitch," he said quickly. You couldn't tell if it was a fit or if he actually meant to say that to you--maybe it was a mix of both considered how flustered and irritated he looked, standing there slightly hunched before you, his hand still at the crotch of his pants. You kicked him pretty fucking hard alright. 

Before you could get another threat out or bluff more about calling the cops (which you were surprised he didn't try to call you out on), Toby jumped back out of the window. As your hand moved and you shifted to the end of the bed, you felt plastic lenses brush against your skin. Another hot flash of anger overtook you as you grabbed Toby's glasses that he'd accidentally left behind. Chances were he'd use them as an excuse to come back and you weren't exactly in the fucking mood. 

Jumping to your feet, you stormed towards the window, the orange lenses tight in your grip. You hurled them out as hard as you could into the darkness, hoping that by some miracle they'd hit Toby on the fucking head. 

"Don't forget your STUPID _FUCKING_ GLASSES!" you'd hollered after him, leaning out the window, your fingers tight on the windowsill. 

With a furious exhale, you ducked back into your room, slammed the window shut and locked it. You double checked to make sure it wouldn't budge. Your eyes had gotten used to the darkness by now. As you looked through the glass one last time, to see if he was gone yet, you saw Toby on the ground, no more than a few feet away from the house, staring up at you. You felt something against the side of your hand. 

Looking down, you realized Toby had left your (cracked) phone on the windowsill, apparently on his way out.

You checked out the window again to see he was still there. Scowling, you flipped him off, pressing your hand to the window to make sure he could see it clearly. Then, you closed the curtain swiftly and whirled around, not even wanting to bare him the satisfaction of a witness to his reaction. You stormed back to the bed and threw yourself down upon the mattress, trying to force back the tears that had suddenly reappeared in your eyes. 

Shakily, you reached to the nightstand for the pill bottle. 

The next few nights after that, you had trouble sleeping once more. Thank _God_ you had the pills, however, as they still managed to drag you into a decent sleep. Your newfound paranoia was only a daytime occasion, luckily, instead of manifesting into more night terrors. In an attempt to soothe your worries, you decided it'd be best if you stayed put in your house and kept the doors locked. You also triple checked the lock on your window every night, almost manically, just so you could even feel secure enough to get into bed and let your guard down. 

And then one night, you were checking, as you habitually did and the lock was just.

Gone. 

Apparently picked and broken off, it seemed. 

Toby.

He was going to come for you.


	8. 10:01

The sleeping pill bottle was open. Abandoned.

You'd considered taking one. 

But you couldn't risk leaving yourself vulnerable. Not when Toby was coming for you. 

Most of the night you spent pacing your room, anxiously. Repeatedly, obsessively you glanced down at your phone, turning it on and off to check the time. Seconds felt like minutes and minutes like hours. Eventually, you couldn't stand the squeezing feeling on your heart any longer, an smacked your phone down onto the nightstand at your bedside, running a stressed, shaking hand through your hair. You put your palms to your face for a few, long moments, standing motionless, listening to the sound of your own quick breathing.

Out of habit, you picked up your phone again to check the time.

_10:01_

A soft grunt sounded from across the room. You looked up, your breath hitching in your throat, your eyes trained on the window. It was opening. Slowly. Your heart practically stopped upon catching sight of gloved hands. You knew who they belonged to. Who else could it have been, after all? 

When he finally crept through the window and his boots just barely touched the floor of your bedroom, you broke out of your frozen state. He didn't even have time to look up before you turned to the nightstand, grabbed the first thing you saw (a tissue box) and hurled it at him as hard as you could. Quickly, his arm shot up and you flinched, stepping back, as he caught the box with ease. 

"Wait, wait, wait," he tried, holding up his other hand to show he was unarmed. You didn't care. You still remembered the feelings of his fingers digging into your skin while he stood over you and threatened to kill you. You didn't even give him the chance to try to explain himself once again. What more was for him to explain? 

He was a murderer. He was nothing but bad news and you didn't want anywhere near him ever again. 

"What the fuck do you want?" you snapped, accusingly, as hostile as you could muster. "Why the fuck did you break the lock off my window? You finally gonna kill me like you fucking promised?" He seemed to almost wince meekly at the severity and venom in your words. 

He shook his head, with a bit of difficulty, as it seemed like his tics were getting bad again. "N-no. I-I'm not gon-gonna kill you. I-I-I don't even ha-have my hatchets with me. I-I can show you. You'll see." 

It seemed to be his strange way of asking permission to come closer, even though there was nothing stopping him from doing what he wanted anyways. Even if he wasn't lying about his axes, he still had about a foot of height on you and was terrifyingly strong. Once again, you remembered the way he'd thrown you around like a rag doll in the woods only a few days ago. Awkwardly, he rubbed at his arm, his actions faltering with every small twitch he was attempting to control. His face seemed to contort with concentration behind his mask and lenses (which were cracked). 

You wondered if he was trying to trick you into letting your guard down so he could kill you.

Only one way to find out. 

Your mind went to the blade you knew you had stashed still in the drawer nearby. You let yourself lean onto it for comfort, figuring if things went south you could still have somewhat of a fighting chance. Slowly, your fingers arched against the wood of the nightstand, betraying your wariness. 

Toby seemed to take your silence as a yes as he slowly stepped closer, his empty hand still facing you and the tissue box still in his other hand. As he drew closer and into better lighting, you found that he seemed to be telling the truth. His hatchets were no where to be seen on his body. Not on his back, and the holsters at his hips were empty. You couldn't think of any where else he might be hiding them. Your gaze left his body and returned to his face. 

Gently, when he was only a few inches away from you, he reached across and put the tissue box back on the nightstand. You flinched when his arm came too close to you and he briefly looked away, a wave of guilt coming over him so intensely you could second hand experience it. The fan whirring above stirred his thick curls ever so slightly as he took some big steps back away from you. He stood before you, looking even more awkward and embarrassed. It made him a lot less intimidating, but you knew he was still dangerous.

Quietly, you spoke. "If you're not going to kill me tonight then..." your head tilted slightly as his dark eyes met yours again. "Then why are you here?" It took everything you had to keep your voice from shaking. 

He continued to simply stand before you, awkwardly. He'd began to fidget and pick at his fingers. He was lucky the gloves were there to protect his skin from any damage. You bit the inside of your cheek, practically holding your breath. Eventually, a heavy sigh left him and he put a hand to the back of his head, scratching at his scalp. He still wouldn't look at you.

"Look can we just...can we-we just talk?" he worked up the courage to say. 

"T...Talk?" was all you could say in response, not sure whether you were more outraged or uncomfortable. 

He gave a brisk nod. "Ju-just talk. Please?" In another rather bold, probably unwise choice, he took a seat on your bed. Softly, he patted the spot next to him. Another hot flash of anger crossed you. 

You scoffed, crossing your arms and turning your head away. "I don't want to talk to you," you spat stubbornly. "I want you to fucking leave." 

"(Y/N)." 

The sudden steadiness in his voice made you finally look back over to him. Your arms were still tight at your chest as he held your gaze. He reached up to grab your elbow, giving you a bit of a pull. For the sake of not pissing him off, you let him, and sank down into the mattress at his side. Once again, a long silence descended upon the two of you. 

"Do you re-really think my glasses are stupid?" Toby asked, turning his head to look at you, his scarred brows furrowed.

You sighed and couldn't help but roll your eyes, but felt rather relieved when the tension left the room. Your finger and thumb found the bridge of your nose and pinched slightly as you sharply inhaled, feeling a little bit steadier. It was oddly familiar and nice to hear him joking like he used to do. But it could still be trap. 

"No," you answered. "I actually think they're...kinda cool."

Toby chuckled softly. Gently, more so than usual, he took your hand in his, pressing it between his palms. Once again, a mixed feeling of discomfort and...relief (?) fell over you. Was he giving you mixed signals on purpose? Were you reading too much into whatever the fuck was going on? 

"You're kinda cu-cute when you're mad, y'know..." Toby told you, his thumb brushing over the back of your hand. "Stronger than you lo-look too." 

Once again, you had no idea how to respond. You wouldn't look at him, even though you knew he was staring at you. You could practically feel his gaze burning into your skin. This wasn't going how you wanted it to go. But then again, you weren't even sure how something like this was supposed to go. You guessed you expected him to...maybe apologize and leave? Forever? But now feeling his hands gentle on you again had you fuzzy and confused and lost all over again.

_How fucking hard is it to make up my mind? Why does he make it so hard?_ you thought, your brows furrowing as you glared down into your lap, trying to stop the tears from gathering in your eyes.

Once again you had to remind yourself that Toby was a murderer. That he killed someone. That he'd threatened to do the same to you. It hurt to have to think about that all over again--to have to live that over once again. It hurt to suddenly realize once again that a cold-blooded killer was holding your hand, not some sweet boy in the woods. But it seemed so easy to mix the two up and the lines only got more and more blurred the longer he held you there. It made you feel like you were being ripped in two. It hurt. It hurt real badly. 

And that's when you realized. When you really, honestly realized. 

_"You're no good for me."_

It was terrible to say. But it felt like a weight had lifted off your chest now that you had finally said it. He'd never been good for you. Not even when you didn't realize what he really did with those hatchets of his. Between the stealing and your rationalization of your ever dwindling hours of sleep--he'd brought nothing but...bad into your life. You sucked in another harsh breath, trying even harder to hold back your tears. Did that mean all your time with him had just been...a waste? Where had all those weeks gone? 

You looked up at him again. "You're no-" you began to repeat yourself.

His hand suddenly grabbed at your chin. His hand left yours and reached to his mask to pull it down around his neck. His scarred, torn lips pressed against yours as he wrapped an arm around you tightly, passionately. His body weight fell upon you as you fell back onto the bed. For the briefest, most sinful of moments, you leaned into his kiss. Was it awful you took pleasure in it? Were you going to hell for kissing the same man responsible for the loss of who knows how many lives? Should it have been bad that the way he kissed you still sent shivers down your spine? 

God yes. 

What the fuck was _wrong_ with you? 

" _Mfff--no!_ NO!" you suddenly cried out, breaking from his rough lips. You shoved him off you--away from you as hard as you could, feeling beyond disgusted with yourself and increasingly angry with him. 

Startled, he quickly scrambled to his feet, losing his balance due to your shove and knocking into the nightstand. The bulk of his jacket knocked over your open sleeping pill bottle, spilling it into the crack between the bed and the furniture. He seemed genuinely and completely confused, a bit flustered as well judging by the obvious heat in his face and the flush in his scarred cheeks. 

"Sorry, sorry, I-I've got it, I-I've g-got it." He continued to apologize profusely even as he knelt down, shoulders pushing the nightstand away from the bedside as he wedged himself into the gap in a frazzled attempt to collect the pills that he'd knocked onto the floor. 

You still sat on the bed, chest heaving quickly as you watched him through scared, conflicted eyes. After a few moments of fumbling and underhanded curses under his trembling breath, he straightened up. He turned to face you, giving the now secured orange bottle a bit of a shake to prove to you that all the pills he'd spilled were now safely contained. Still watching for your reaction, he slowly put it back on your nightstand, pushing it further back to avoid any possibility of knocking it over again. 

He cleared his throat. "I'm-" he began, but once again, you didn't give him the chance.

Murderers didn't deserve chances. Toby didn't deserve the chance. 

"You need to go," you said to him, once again fighting back tears.

Your fingers curled tightly into the sheets as you bit your bottom lip. You were no good at hiding what you were truly feeling. You were no good at pretending you could be heartless and just turn him away after all you'd put into him--after everything he'd put into you. He'd been your _friend_. Maybe something a little more than that if you wanted to be honest with yourself. You were ashamed now to realize how often he'd dominated your thoughts all those weeks ago. How all your days revolved around when you'd see him next. 

It was over. It was all over. 

You couldn't continue.

It would kill you if Toby didn't first. 

Unfortunately, that seemed to be the one thing Toby didn't pick up on--the one thing he genuinely didn't understand, maybe _couldn't_ understand, no matter how hard you tried. You could see that in the way he looked at you, so desperate with those dark, soft brown eyes of his. So wanting of you. So needing. 

"Will you s-see me again?" he asked, confirming your suspicions. 

Unable to bring yourself to directly reject him, you buried your face in your hands. You bit back a sob before looking back up at him, tears rolling down your cheeks as your body began to shake. He was blurry now in your vision.

"I. I don't know. I don't want to. I'm not going to," you eventually choked out. 

It broke your heart to see his expression changed. He looked sad. Like the saddest you had ever seen another living soul. It was tragic the way he still partway regarded you, with just as much passion and desire as before. Like he didn't understand. He _couldn't_ understand, you reminded yourself. There was something wrong with Toby. Deeply wrong. And it wasn't his Tourette's or his kleptomania or his strange behavior. That had nothing to do with anything at all. Those didn't make him wrong. None of that could have made him 'bad'. 

It was just.

Him.

Toby was wrong.

There was this...this darkness in him, you now realized. This great potential for evil, for genuine, real, uncontrollable and unpredictable evil. Something that no human should have been capable of. No human you wanted to be around anyways. Something had happened to him a long, long time ago. Something you'd never find out and something you never wanted to find out anyways. 

You couldn't be there for him. You couldn't help him. He couldn't be better, even if he wanted to, and that was maybe the worst part of all. 

Too far gone. 

The worst wave of guilt you'd ever felt in your life swallowed you whole, like a tidal wave. You had to look away. You couldn't stare into those sad brown eyes anymore. Your turned your head entirely, shutting your eyes tightly as you clasped a hand over your mouth to muffle another cry of anguish. Your hands dropped back down as you wrapped your arms around yourself, hunching over, gritting your teeth as soft sobs shook you. 

When you opened your eyes again and straightened up he was gone.

The window was still open.


	9. i dont want you

A week later and you were completely out of sleeping pills. You knew that wasn't right at all. You were supposed to have had way more--enough to last the rest of the month. To make matters worse, your prescription didn't refill for another two weeks. You considered calling to ask what you could do, but then you became nervous. How were you supposed to explain half of the drugs in the bottle just vanishing? Someone was going to ask questions and you knew you wouldn't have answers. And that would make you seem even more suspicious. 

For a moment, you'd sat on the bed, knuckles to your lips, an arm wrapped around your abdomen. Could you go two weeks without those pills? You didn't think so. You were so used to sleeping with them now you didn't think you could suddenly go cold turkey that fast. Your eyes, half-filled with tears, had drifted over to the nightstand where the empty bottle sat. And you remembered the week before when Toby had knocked them over with the bulk of his jacket. And how long it took him to pick up those pills. 

And that lead you to only one conclusion to as where your pills had gone.

That son of a bitch. 

Your fingers had clenched into tighter fists and you'd gone to stand up. Your first thought was to storm out there into the woods and confront him. But then, you took a few deep breaths, seating yourself again before running a stressed hand through your hair. No. You couldn't do that. That was probably what Toby wanted. It was a trap. You didn't know why he wanted to get you out there again, why he wanted you to come to him, but you didn't intend on finding out. That burning curiosity that was once part of you had appropriately faded after everything that had happened. Now, you could only feel fear and disdain, preferring to leave the unknown unknown. It was curiosity that had gotten you into all this in the first place wasn't it? 

I'm not going out there. I'm not going out there. 

Even though you thought you wouldn't be able to sleep, it didn't mean you weren't going to try. So, you tried to do your usual nightly routine, hoping by some psychological means it would trick your brain into letting you sleep. You thought it might have actually worked when you became increasingly drowsy. But when you got into bed, you could only stay drowsy for a little while before once again becoming wide awake. A familiar feeling of anguish and torment filled you as you squeezed your eyes shut, your motions becoming more irritated and jerky. Every position. Comforter on. Comforter off. Switch pillow. Throw off a blanket. Change sides of the bed. None of it worked. 

About three days later with a collective four hours of sleep you snapped. You'd been disappointed in yourself. You'd intended to last longer than that. 

Fine. I'll take the fucking bait. 

You didn't even bother grabbing a coat on the way out, even if it was getting chilly outside. You wanted to be in and out of there in under twenty minutes if you could. Any longer and you thought he'd find a way to make you stay with him. All you wanted was to just be rid of him. Like he never existed. If only he'd let you do that. You were sure both of you could be happier that way. Your tearful gaze fell upon the familiar trail, worn even more down by footprints you'd come to recognize as your own from the times you used to willingly come all the way out here. You wiped at your eyes and looked back up in time to find the way to the usual meeting spot.

Lo and behold, just as you expected, he sat there, waiting upon the stump, elbows on his knees, head down and shoulder slouched like he had dozed off while waiting. Lucky bastard. You cleared your throat, leaning up against a tree and crossing your arms as his head lifted again. He reached up quickly to pull down his mask, revealing his torn lips before standing up suddenly. 

"Th-thought you wouldn't come," he said, tucking his trembling hands in his pocket. 

"Didn't want to come," you shot back, hoping he could read the aggravation in your tense voice. You shifted off of the tree as he came closer, getting ready to run again if he needed to. After all, last time you were alone in the forest with him, he'd thrown you to the ground and threatened to kill you with a blade to your throat. 

His mentioned hatchets hung at his sides, holstered. His hands didn't seem anywhere close to them. That didn't ease your anxiety at all. 

"So how-" he started.

"You stole my fucking pills." Cut straight through the bullshit. Take control. He stole from you with the intent of forcing you to come to him. He deserved whatever rudeness you had to offer him. Still, you hated that a part of you, deep down, seemed to twist and flinch, hating that you were actively trying to be mean to him. But what else could you do to drive him further away? To try and sever whatever was left of you two. 

Toby straightened up, making you nervous. He looked as though he was going to back down before so you hoped he wasn't suddenly gaining a backbone. The smile had disappeared from his face as he looked down at you. God you were suddenly scared as all hell. 

"I have my reasons," was all he said. 

The lack of care, of anything in his suddenly cold voice was what finally pushed you. You'd come into the forest almost half-hoping to make him cry, to make him break so he'd leave you the fuck alone forever. You'd wanted to hurt him so he'd know to stay far away. Far, far away. But all the sudden, the tears you'd fought back at the old path returned and you couldn't stop them. God you were so tired. You just wanted it to be over. You wanted to just go home and go to fucking sleep. You didn't want to be here, with him, anywhere but here with anyone else. 

Although you tried to keep your voice stable and your face neutral, it clearly wasn't working. You reached a hand up to your eyes, clenching your teeth, unable to control the feeling of torment once again inside your tightening chest. "Where the fuck are they?" you'd started, your voice low. "Where the fuck are they? Where the fuck are they?" 

You'd gone from quiet to screaming in a flash, your blood beginning to pound so hard in your ears you couldn't hear. You could barely see straight, your lack of sleep having already impaired your vision. The hot tears weren't helping as they streamed down your face. You felt like you were suddenly losing your balance. A soft sob escaping you, you leaned back against the tree, your fingers arched against the bark as you cried. You were just so frustrated. And tired, so fucking tired. Static? Was that static you were hearing? You almost preferred death over the feeling of burning in your eyes and constant, constant fatigue in your limbs. It was too close. Too close to home. Too much of a reminder of the state you often found yourself in before Toby. Before you'd figured out that walking in the woods could fix you, just temporarily. 

Apparently, seeing you meltdown completely in a manner of seconds and become a shaking, crying mess was enough to stir Toby. 

"I had to-to see you." His own breath seemed to quiver as he came closer. "I h-had to see y-you. Do-don't you unders-stand? You c-can't just-" He let out a frustrated sigh. Despite the cold demeanor he'd put on, his real emotions were showing through the unusual intensity of his tics. "You can't ju-just, lea-leave me. Not after a-all we have, a-after all we-we did."

You'd tuned him out halfway through. The static noise was becoming unbearable. That, and if Toby wasn't telling you where your sleeping pills were, you didn't want to fucking hear it. You were done with his obsession, his excuses. But that didn't make a difference. His obsession had been one sided for awhile now and that sure didn't stop him before. You wondered how much further he'd go. You wondered what else he was capable of as the clean memory of him standing over the bloody body flashed in your head. 

Slowly, you found the words in your addled brain. "We've only known each other...for a month or two. Shut the fuck up." You looked up at him your brows knotting with anguish as he stared back down at you, his eyes slightly widened behind orange lenses. "Just...shut. The fuck up." With a bit of a grunt, you went to stand up. God the static was getting bad. You thought you'd gotten used to it by now, but apparently not. It wasn't like any sort of tinnitus...

Still, you couldn't find your balance. You winced, squeezing your eyes shut and getting ready to lean back up against the tree. Suddenly, unprompted, Toby grabbed your wrists. He pulled you slack body closer, despite you trying to pull your hands back. Your cheek collided against his chest as a harsh exhale left your slightly parted lips.

"Come with me. C-come with me," he suddenly begged you, like those had been the actual words he'd had on his mind this whole time. "What's there le-left for you to lost? Wh-what do you have t-to lose?" 

Hysterically, you shook your head violently, trying to pull away from him. Either his grip was more iron tight than you last remembered or you really were the weakest you'd ever been. A few louder sobs came from you as he tried to hold you closer, twitching, desperate arms crossing over your body. 

"YOU THREATENED TO KILL ME A WEEK AGO. YOU MURDERED SOMEONE, I SAW THE BODY!" came your sudden shriek, muffled at first before you turned your head up, your chin angled straight up on top of his chest as another loud cry escaped you. You could barely see him through the tears on your wet eyelashes.

"HE HURT YOU. YOU TOLD ME HE HURT YOU. HE DESERVED IT, HE DESERVED IT," Toby seemed to scream back, your snap influencing his own. "I CUT OFF HIS HANDS. I CUT THEM OFF SO HE COULD NEVER TOUCH YOU EVER AGAIN. AND THEN I SLASHED HIS EYES OUT TOO, SO HE COULD NEVER LOOK AT YOU AGAIN. FOR YOU! I DID IT ALL FOR YOU!"

His screams seemed to shake the very forest, drowning out the obnoxious static. You cried harder as he started to shake you again. 

"TOBY, STOP!" you shrieked, trying to vainly pull away from him again. 

But he wouldn't. He wouldn't let you go. He'd never let you go. You let a monster love you and now you were going to pay the price. As long as you were alive and there was breath in his own body, you'd pay. 

You tears practically soaked through the fabric clinging to his chest, leaving large, dark stains. His larger hands seemed to press up upon the back of your neck and your head, gripping tightly into your tangled, disheveled hair. You thought your throat was going to close you were sobbing so hard. 

"I don't want you," you eventually said softly, your voice hoarse and close to a whisper--so different from the previous screams. But equally as anguished. You thought if Toby had any heart left in him, your words would have broken it. But he didn't move. He didn't flinch. He held you as tightly as before as your eyes half-shut, your hands falling slack on him. "I don't fucking want you..." 

You'd stopped thrashing and struggling now. Not because he was softly shushing you, his hand now petting over your hair slowly. But because you simply had lost the energy, the will, to keep fighting him. He'd always win, you were beginning to realize. You were so fucking tired. You sniffled against his chest. 

"Why don't you just fucking do it," you tried again, your voice shaking. "Fucking kill me." 

His hand fell away from your head. His other hand followed. They went down to gently grasp at your wrists. With strength he didn't expect, you slid your hands out of his grip, grabbing his own wrists before he could have a go at yours again. You pulled them up across your chest, along your collarbone, until they were at your neck. Shaking, you wrapped his hands around your throat, pushing down on them. 

"Come on. Fucking do it," you murmured out, looking up at him with half-lidded eyes. When he didn't make any motion, your eyebrows contorted again. "FUCKING DO IT!" you suddenly snarled, trying to squeeze his palms around your neck tighter. 

With ease, he pushed your palms off his. His hand returned a moment later, looking like it was going for your throat like you had desperately begged. Instead, he cradled your jaw in his palm, his fingers cold against your skin.

He won't do it. 

Not even after what he threatened. 

He wouldn't do it. 

Looking up into his dark eyes, you suddenly reached to his waist. His other free hand had gone to hold your hand to his body, like he craved your touch more than anything in the whole world. But you were too fast for him. Your hand jerked lower to his hip, grabbing the head of one of his hatchets and yanking it out of the holster. With your other hand, you finally shoved him away. 

As he stumbled, you took another few steps back. Automatically, when he regained his balance, his hand went to the other blade. Toby faltered. He didn't take out the remaining hatchet. His bottom lip quivered slightly as he watched you. Realizing that the power had shifted, you brandished out his own hatchet at him, glaring at him through reddened, narrowed eyes. You took more steps back. He didn't move. Was he scared? You'd never thought it'd be your turn to make him scared. It'd always been you. Always you...

"S-stay the fuck away from me," you finally choked out, your voice still shaking. It was taking everything you had not to burst into tears all over again. "I never wanna see you ever fucking again. Freak."

Without warning, you raised the hatchet and hurled it at him. You'd meant not to aim directly for him. But your head and your arm had very different ideas. You'd wanted to regret the action the moment it'd taken place--the moment you'd purposely aimed for his curly head. But your rage had consumed you and you could only feel a sort of sick satisfaction. Lucky for Toby, he ducked, narrowly avoiding his own blade flying through the air, directly back at him. 

You didn't want to wait. You didn't want to listen to him any longer. You were free of his hands and you had to take advantage of that before he grew angry again. He wasn't going to tell you where your pills were. He certainly wasn't going to give them back to you. He'd never planned to give them back to you, you came to realize. This was all a waste of your time.

You should have fucking known better.

Quickly, you whirled around and stomped off, shoving through any branches in your way. For the first few seconds you felt a cold, sudden terror, realizing you were now vulnerable to him again. You expected a hatchet to be lodged in your back at any moment. 

But there was nothing.

Only his distant call--for you.

"(Y/N)!"

You didn't look back.


	10. lighter fluid

Bags and clothes laid strewn out across the floor and over the bed. Your anxious hand sorted through your pile of necessities, picking through again and again, eliminating smaller items every time in an attempt to make the pile smaller. You only need enough to fill a bag you could sling around your shoulder. Filling a suitcase, although tempting, would be too much to move and ultimately just slow you down. 

_Just the necessities,_ you repeated to yourself again and again like a broken record. 

But it was hard. It was hard doing what you were about to do. Although your house had felt empty and hollow, skeletal and trapping all around you, it had been somewhat of a home. Somewhere with doors and windows that could lock. Well, all but one window now, anyways. You'd always felt as though you were less of a resident and more of a ghost, haunting the halls, even from when you first moved in. 

You'd folded the clothes you'd chosen as tightly as you could, cramming them in the corner of the bag to create as much room as possible. 

_Phone. Charger. Water bottle._

The side pockets on the bag weren't very deep but they'd have to do.

_Toothbrush. Pocket knife. Wallet._

You found yourself staring into the bag now, hands on either side of it. 

_Is there anything else I'm forgetting? I can't remember anything I'm supposed to pack whenever I pack._

You wondered if it'd be mildly amusing if you had to turn back to grab something you forgot, ruining what, in your head, was supposed to be a dramatic goodbye to everything you knew and recognize. The smile faded off your face. _Everything_ you knew. It'd been awhile since you'd been in contact with any of your friends, who had all drifted away when you'd began to isolate yourself. You were grateful for that now, meaning they wouldn't notice if you left without saying goodbye and it wouldn't stress them out that you were gone because...well in their heads, you were already gone in a way. 

Deciding to take your mind off the bag so any other ideas of what you might need could pop up, you stepped away. Your heart nearly stopped when you thought you saw something outside the window--but a second glance and nothing showed up at all. Maybe a bird had flown past or something. When had you become so jumpy and paranoid?

_Oh yeah, since fucking forever._

Still, running a hand through your hair stressfully, you pushed back the fear. The lock on the window was still broken. A bit of a frown appeared on your face. Your gaze landed on the dresser off to the side of your room, against the wall. With a surprising amount of effort you didn't know you were capable of exerting, you managed to wedge yourself against the side of the dresser and the corner and slowly start to push it across the floor. A grunt of effort left you as you slowly made your way towards the window. When you finally had it pushed in front of the window, you could stand up straight and breathe a real sigh of relief. No one looking at you anymore. No one could come through.

And when you said "no one" you actually meant _him_. 

Feeling a new sort of determination, you returned to the bed, scooping everything that hadn't been packed yet up into your trembling arms and dumping them in the bag. You zipped it up and slung it over your shoulder before you had time to think again and start the process all over again. It'd already taken you about two nights to even work up the nerve to pull out the bag from your closet in the first place. 

You didn't have a car but that wouldn't stop you. Nothing would. You had to get the hell out. Now. 

If all went according to your plan, he wouldn't even know you were gone until it was too late. Too late to stop you, too late to find you ever again. The idea of suddenly disappearing had been in your head for a long, long time, even before you'd met him, actually. A sense of bitterness overcame you. He'd originally been the reason you'd stayed in this town. This town with all of its hellish memories and rooted trauma and indifferent people who'd look the other way when they saw bruises and marks on your face. But now he was the reason you were leaving. For real. 

You reached for your phone, taking it off the nightstand and grasping it tightly in your hand. 

You didn't look back at the room. You were never one for "one last look" or any of that. It only made leaving harder. You left the room, closing the door, hard. You kept your eyes to floor as you headed for the front door. No point in locking it as you left. You weren't coming back anyways. 

And then, all you had to do was find a main road and start walking. It was only an hour or two before it turn into open road, into a main freeway, usually empty for the day. From there, you turned to the road, sticking up a thumb and biting the inside of your cheek as you waited, your other hand clenched tight at the strap of the bag on your shoulder. Many cars passed you by without what felt like a second glance or any hesitation, making you feel like even more of a ghost than you already were. 

But then finally, _finally_ , a semi truck pulled off to your side of the road. 

Relief filled you as you stepped up to the passenger side, up onto the platform running along the side of the truck as the driver unlocked the door. You opened it and stepped inside, sitting down silently in the passenger seat, your bag gripped tightly in your lap. 

You didn't care who was driving. You didn't care where you'd go next. You just needed to be gone.

"Where ya' headed?" the driver asked.

You didn't look at him. You only looked up to direct your gaze straight out the windshield. "Wherever you're going is good enough for me." 

He seemed to laugh. "Well then, you're in for quite a long drive." 

Your expression didn't falter. "All the better." 

Lucky for you, the stranger wasn't much of a talker after that. He'd left you alone to stare off out the window, watching your surroundings streak by as you still processed your actions. You didn't know what was going to happen to you next, where you would end up next, or why. And that felt like a breath of fresh air to you. Being far away from that town, from that forest, from _him_ already allowed you to breathe easier, with your whole chest, fully, for the first time in a long time. 

You glanced down at your phone in your hand. 

You opened the camera roll.

You found the picture of you and him.

And you looked at it for the briefest of seconds. Your face. Then his face. The calm before the storm. Weird to see it captured in pixels on your screen. 

Your thumb tapped the delete button. 

* * *

By nightfall, Toby made his rounds as he usually did, sneaking by your house, peering up towards your window to see if he was lucky enough to catch you asleep or maybe even pacing your room. You'd been pacing for the past few nights and he liked to watch to make sure you didn't hurt yourself or run into anything and fall over. Then he could swoop in and save you, just like he'd done in his head a million times over and you'd love him again.

But this time, when he looked up through orange tinted lenses, he found with a flash of irritation that your window was being blocked by furniture. How dare you!? After he'd been patrolling your house and property for so long, keeping it safe from unwanteds and intruders. Were you not understanding of his efforts to make sure you were protected even if he was a little mad with you? 

After staring at the blocked window he gave a simple shrug of his shoulders. Just because the windows were blocked didn't mean the door couldn't be forced open. For the longest time he'd been able to sneak around carefree in your house when you were sleeping--you apparently hadn't made a habit of locking your door, even before you met him. But recently, the door had been locked to his disappointment, and busting it down would have woken you up or startled you. But damn it'd been tempting to do it the past few nights just so he could see you again, just so he could talk to you and be in the same room as you.

He missed you.

And what if you were hurt and on the floor dying? He wouldn't be able to see because of the blocked window--that's what!

That new, irrational idea lodged in his brain, Toby made a direct beeline for your front door. He tried the door before resorting to force, and found with a sort of eager surprise that it was unlocked and open--for him? Had you finally forgiven him? Was this your way of inviting him back inside to see you so you could patch things up with him? But then a sort of dread filled him when he recalled how uncommon it was nowadays for your door to be...just unlocked like that. Had something terrible really happened to you? 

Frantically, Toby ran to your room, opening the door to that to. Nothing. The bed wasn't made, some clothes of yours still remained, but you were gone and so was your phone and a majority of your things. He couldn't help but snag a few clothing articles from your dresser, pushing them up to his masked face, bowing his head. He really did miss you. Your scent was one of the few things that brought him true, relaxing comfort anymore. He ended up tucking away a few garments in his jacket pocket before calling your name.

No response.

His panic growing, Toby began to search every room of the house. The more rooms he searched and the less results he came up with, the angrier he became. It was uncontrollable, burning in him. Eventually, letting out a cry of frustration, he smashed his fist into a wall, loud enough so that if you were hiding you could hear it.

"You ca-can't f-fucking hide from m-me," he growled out, irritation dripping in his voice. 

Once he finished searching the whole house as intensely as he could, he even made another round, just incase you were moving about when he wasn't paying attention. He sprung into random, different rooms, manically, unpredictably, hoping to catch you at the right moment. Obviously this little game of hide and seek of yours was growing increasingly annoying, but the idea that you were willing to play a game like this with him instead of hiding away in your room and screaming at him and making his ears hurt was already an upgrade. The silence wasn't exactly his cup of tea either. He just wanted to hear your voice--your normal voice.

He called your name again. When there was no response, he smashed his fist into the wall once again before letting out a frustrated sigh.

"(Y/N), c-come out right n-now or I swear t-to God, I'll burn this fu-fucking house down and f-fucking d-drag your burnt co-corpse from the ru-rubble mys-self," Toby threatened as a last attempt at coaxing you out of your hiding place. All he wanted to do was _talk_ to you for God's sake, why were you making this so difficult? It _never_ had to be like this...

When there was no response, Toby felt less guilt and regret about what he was about to do. 

You really had forced his hand...tragic for you. 

Plan B. 

Force you out. 

He hated the fact that he had to use the lighter fluid he'd stolen the night before, just with this scenario in mind. He hated that he had to trace it around the house, leading it to what he decided would be the most flammable objects. He hated that he had to pull out his lighter and start flicking at it to get it to ignite. 

He wouldn't call himself an arsonist by nature per se, but every time he gets to light something, _anything_ , on fire he felt a familiar rush. He was sure it was pleasurable as well, judging by the way his heart skipped a beat as he raised a thin, beaten up kitchen towel to his flame before tossing it on the floor, right where it could reach the lighter fluid trail. 

Toby turned and left the house briskly, taking cover in some nearby bushes where he could watch from a safe distance. Where the flames could reflect in his dark, hungry, _angry_ eyes. 

And there he waited.


End file.
